Crows and Ravens
by superdoodlesmaximum
Summary: Crow and Kina have been best friends for almost their entire lives. Almost two halves of the same person. Can a relationship as strong as theirs survive the hell hole that is the DW?
1. Chapter 1

G-block

"Mail call!" the guard called. It was one of the few things he looked forward to in this horrible place. Even if he wouldn't admit it to anyone, it made everything about his life a little easier to bear. Ever since he'd been thrown into this hellhole, mail call had brought him hope. And he needed some hope. It had been a week since he had gotten his last letter. And that wasn't right. He got a letter everyday without fail. He never wrote back-putting the truth of his situation and his feelings down on paper was something he couldn't bring himself to do. He couldn't let her know how bad it really was. And she seemed to understand it. She told him about her days, what was happened, how she was fairing out in the "real" world. And she always proclaimed his innocence, no matter how many times she'd been told otherwise. "No mail today Crow," the guard said with what Crow thought might have been sympathy. The guard rushed down the hall yelling "mail call" as he went. That was it; he knew that there was something wrong.

It would be another full week before he found out what had happened. And the news came from Ganta, being his usual innocent self.

Ganta was walking through the unit with Shiro when they came across and open door. Shiro-being Shiro-peeked inside and saw a female that she had never seen before. With a collar on. Ganta stopped and tried to reprimand Shiro about her lack of manners when the girl turned around and smiled. She couldn't be much older than her mid-twenties. Her hair was a long chestnut color, her eyes were green and her skin was honey colored, but there was an ashen cast to it which Ganta recognized was the effect of severe pain. She wasn't wearing the usual prisoner garb though. She was in a sweater that was just a bit oversized so it hid the shape of her body and the sleeves covered her hands. She smiled when she saw them standing there and invited them in. Shiro bounced in and Ganta walked in, slightly cautious as he had come to be whenever he met a new person. Once he was in her room he could tell that she was a new inmate. The rules and regulations book was open on the bed.

"Hi," Shiro said happily, her usual giggle following the word. "I'm Shiro, and this Ganta, he's my best friend," she said beaming. "What's your name?"

"I'm Kina, Kina Ahoi. It's nice to meet you Shiro and Ganta,"her smile was a ghost of what it obviously had used to be. It wasn't that she wasn't happy, but her smile wasn't touching her eyes, she was just…_hollow…_Ganta thought.

"So are you new?" Ganta said as he pointed to the open book on her bed. The blankets hadn't ever been put over the bed yet. They were sitting in a neat, folded pile on the foot of it. She nodded. "Would you like us to show you around?" She was surprised, a fact made obvious by the widening of her eyes and the delay in her response. But after she nodded, she was smiling and Shiro grabbed her hand happily. There wasn't really much to say though. Ganta explained how the cast points worked and where the best places for snacks were with Shiro adding in all of her personal favorites and making Kina promise she would try at least half of them. He avoided asking about her crime though. Just because she looked innocent didn't mean she was.

Ganta felt bad for the thought the instant he had it. He looked innocent and he _was_. Shiro lived in DW and he knew that at least _some_ of the Deadmen had been set up so that they could be taken to jail. He wondered if she were a Deadman too but something about her didn't seem right for it. When she walked, she had an odd sway as if walking caused her joints pain. But the collar around her neck meant at least one thing, whatever she was accused of-guilty or no-had been something violent. When they passed the workout room, Ganta decided to introduce Kina to him. After all Crow was not only powerful, he was mostly polite to women, if not very panicky when it came to his idea of "immodesty".

"Hey Crow," he called as they walked in. "I want you to meet someone," Crow was standing next to a punching bag and stopped its swinging with his hand as he turned.

"Hey Ga-" he stopped short.

_What is she doing here_? He thought, his mind racing. _No, no this isn't right. Kina…_

She smiled at him and it was a genuine full smile. Ganta and Shiro stood back, confused. Ganta had never seen Crow upset like he was right now. His mouth was open slightly, his eyes wide and his hands were trembling. Was it fear? Was it anger? Ganta couldn't place it. His answer came soon enough as Crow started yelling. One long yell full of confusion and anger and hurt. Shiro cringed and hid behind Ganta. Ganta shut the door to try to contain whatever was about to happen.

"You shouldn't be here!" he bellowed; slamming his fist straight through the punching bag. Shiro whimpered behind Ganta and clung to his back. Crow yelled again and this time his Crow Claw cut through the chain holding the back and through the bag cutting it to ribbons and spilling all of the sand inside. "You shouldn't be here!" he yelled again.

Kina just stood there, sad, close to tears, but unmoving as Crow went around the room destroying any and everything he could get his hands on. Dumbbells, barbells, benches, tables and everything else was quickly turned to piles of useless scraps. When he finally shattered the wall length mirror he left his hand pressed against the glass and stood there breathing heavily. Shaking his head it seemed like the weight of the world had suddenly been dumped onto his back.

Kina walked over to him, helped him turn around and wrapped her arms around him. Ganta felt like he shouldn't be seeing this, it was obviously something intimate for the two of them. At least he learned one thing, Kina was innocent. Crow wouldn't act like this over someone that had hurt anyone or anything. He made sure Shiro had her back turned as well and tried to make the both of them as small as possible to give as much privacy as possible.

"Why?"

"I'm like you…I just didn't know it,"she sounded so sad but Crow sounded _destroyed_. "I was walking to work and when I got there, after a few minutes…everything went wrong," Ganta knew where this was going. So did Crow. Her friends and coworkers had all been killed. She had been blamed, arrested and instead of giving her a fair trial, Kana was found guilty based off of no doubt forged evidence, and Kina was thrown into DW.

"But you're sick…you can barely walk without your meds…how could they find you guilty?"

"They said I did it while I was on medicine, that I used the relief it gave me to murder everyone," there was no emotion in her voice. She was cold and factual. Crow made a sound so pitiful it made Ganta's stomach churn. He didn't want to be there, he didn't want to hear this. HE didn't want to know that Crow could _be_ this sad.

After that it was just silent. Shiro was starting to get antsy so it seemed like the perfect time to leave the room. They left quickly. When the door latched shut kina put her hands on either side of Crow's face and forced him to look her in the eyes.

"I'll kill them,"it was a growl;a vow. "I'll kill all of them, everyone who did this to you." Kina shook her head but it didn't matter. Crow kept talking. "I'll make everyone see that they're fake and evil. I swear it!"

"I know Senji," she let him rant.

"You can't stay here, you can't fight with your illness."

"Makina makes sure I get my medicine and I've already done one Carnival Corpse, I won relatively quick,"She felt Crow tremble and the hatred that flashed through his eyes bordered on madness. "It's ok Senji, see? I'm okay."

"No you aren't! You know just as well as I do that you won't be able to fight long! You'll end up ruined! You're shaking right now and your face is so pale!" If she didn't know him better, Kina thought he may have hit her. She knew that she wasn't going to be able to get him to understand. She had accepted it but Senji wouldn't. He was so used to protecting her, used to being able to make her sit and lie down and rest. But now that power was stripped away. Now she Kina was in mortal danger and there was nothing he could do to save her.

"What's your name?"

"Raven."

"What's your Branch of Sin?"

"Razor wing," she knew he was just searching for something to change the subject, something that might seem slightly normal. Given their predicament talking about their names and Branches of Sin _was_ normal. She pulled her hands away from his face and felt a reluctant tug in her chest.

She stepped back a few feet and took off her sweat shirt. What she was wearing underneath was still loose; a long sleeve shirt with specifically cut slits in the arms. On the inside bottom of the sleeves there were barbed pieces of metal that lined up with each slit in the sleeve. She pressed the barbs into her arms and then pulled the metal back into her sleeves, tucking it away safely in a padded pocket specially designed for them. Then, out of the four slits in her sleeves came four blades of blood; the closest to her wrist being the shortest and the one at her elbows being the longest. There was an odd look on her face; pride and revulsion mixed together.

Crow hated it, but he had to admit that it was interesting and beautiful in a weird way. But they only lasted for a few moments before a pain grimace slid across Kina's face and she slumped onto the ground. Crow was beside her before she'd hit the floor.

She was sweating and panting and trembling. It was all he could do not to scream again at the injustice of it all. She wasn't healthy, not like she needed to be. And if the prison was giving her her medication who knew what they were doing with it. It could be poisoned, they could add a tranquilizer and make it impossible for her to defend herself in the Carnival Corpse;any number of things could be going on.

"Ganta," Ganta's face was in a crack in the door half a second after Crow said his name. "I want you to take her to her room. I'll be there in a second."

"Why don't you help her? I'm sure she'd like it," it appeared to him as if Kina had passed out. The look on Crow's face was all the answer he needed. The room was going to go through another round of serious abuse. He helped bring Kina to and after he was sure that the trio was far enough away he let loose all of his pent up anger and hurt and aggression in a hurricane of violence.


	2. Chapter 2

It took Crow two weeks to calm down enough to accept the fact the Kina was there. He was still full of rage and anytime a guard or another Deadman looked at Kina it was as if they could feel the anger pouring from his body. And despite what Kina did or said, Crow never completely calmed down. He was always ready for a fight and when he had to perform in a Carnival Corpse, he was twice as ruthless as he used to be. As if he could fight enough to keep Kina from fighting. It seemed to work. Kina didn't get chosen for any fights and she had a steady supply of medication.

Ganta learned a lot about Kina and Crow's relationship. They had met in middle school. He had been getting picked on by a group of older students. Kina had happened to walk by when they started hitting him. Without a thought she pulled all of her text books out of her back and threw them one after the other at the older kids. They stopped hitting Crow and went after her. Crow couldn't stand to see anyone hurt, especially someone who had helped him. So he attacked the boys and beat them all out of sheer willpower and an unwillingness to be beaten. After that Kina and Crow had been inseparable. When Crow graduated from the police academy she was there, clapping and cheering the loudest. When Kina graduated from college with a master's degree in music and art, Crow had been there with the biggest smile and the biggest bunch of flowers.

When Kina turned twenty two and started having health problems, Crow was there every day to take care of her. Whether it was taking her to the doctor, getting her medicine or just helping her get around, he was always there. Their mutual support and caring for each other was a bond stronger than any Ganta had ever seen. Hearing Kina talk about Crow it was obvious she cared for him with all of her heart. She explained how, when she had gotten so sick she couldn't walk, Crow and told her in no uncertain terms, that he was going to move in until she was okay enough to walk and get around on her own. Shiro loved hearing stories about them.

Shiro and Kina bonded quickly, and when she met You she got along well with him. It seemed like there was no one she couldn't like, and no one who couldn't like her. She was a kind person. But there was something about her, something inside of her that demanded respect. She may have been in constant pain, and there may have been days where she couldn't walk, but she was no cripple. Ganta wasn't surprised by that. Crow wouldn't associate himself with someone too weak to handle their own issues; he knew that for a fact. He barely dealt with Ganta when he started crying or acting like a little kid.

"Hey Crow, I have a question," Ganta said one day. They were eating in Kina's room-Crow was almost always there and when he wasn't she was with him-and there was something that had been nagging at the corners of Ganta's mind. "Why is it that you get all…weird around Shiro, but around Kina you're fine?" Crow looked irritated and kept eating.

"Oh you're kidding me right? He still gets all flustered when someone has on tight clothes?" Kina was laughing. It was an infectious sound, tinkling and bright. Crow turned red and grunted noncommittally. Kina laughed even harder.

"I don't like immodesty!" he said, obviously flustered. "The way some women dress, they-they just have no self respect!" He had that excitable look on his face that always accompanied any perceived "immodesty". Kina laughed even harder and fell onto her side. Shiro leaned against her and was laughing almost just as hard.

"So why don't you get flustered around Kina?"

"She obviously has self respect!"as if it was common knowledge.

"Well yes, I do but that has nothing to do with the way I dress. I like baggy clothes. It's like having one giant pocket to hide all sorts of things." Crow looked at her incredulously.

"A giant pocket?" She nodded. "Well that's just stupid." No one saw Kina form her hand into a fist or pull her arm back. But one second Crow was sitting up and the next he was kissing the floor with a giant knot on the back of his head. Shiro turned red from laughing and all Ganta could do was stare.

"That's a rude thing to say Senji."

"And you punching me isn't?! What the hell woman?!" He rubbed his head angrily and scooted just out of her reach.

Their time was carefree and spent in a similar pattern every day. They all woke up and congregated in Kina's room. You spent his days doing whatever it was that he did, Shiro spent days speaking about snacks and what made the best and worst snacks. And Crow was always there. Wherever Kina sat, he was next to her, when she stood, he was behind her like a second shadow. When she wobbled and tumbled from her unsteady legs, he was there to catch it. It seemed normal, like they were all one family. But one day that came to a screeching halt with the announcement of another Carnival Corpse.

Crow versus Raven.

Everyone felt as if they had been punched right in the gut. Crow of course said he'd protect her, he wouldn't fight her, he'd even find a way out of it, but everyone knew that couldn't happen. It didn't stop Crow from trying to give Kina hope and prove that he could still protect her.

When the guards came to escort them to the arena, there was nothing that either of them could do about it. All around them were the cartoon faces of the people paying to see them fight. The rules were fight to death or incapacitation. Both Crow and Kina were going to try to incapacitate someone but who? If Crow hit Kina too hard or cut her too deep he could do irreparable damage. If Kina fought too hard she could do the same thing to herself. There was no way to devise a plan together. The light was on them and the people were waiting for blood.

When they were told to start, both of them brought out their Branches of Sin and for a few seconds, no one moved. And then Crow lunged. Kina saw it coming and dodged it easily. She knew him better than anyone, she knew his movements as if they were her own. Every move Crow did was quickly and easily countered. She was as agile as any trained fighter, as any _healthy_ trained fighter. It was a little confusing for Crow but it brought to him an odd sense of pride. She wasn't _quite_ as helpless as he had first assumed. He knew it couldn't last the entire fight and that she would tire soon. But maybe, just maybe he could find a way for them to both win.

But what about the penalty game? There was no guarantee that either of them would leave alive or even mostly intact. Crow was already missing his right eye. And with the way that the loser lost their body parts was always vicious. Even when it was a procedure that required them to be unconscious the doctor made no motion to make the surgery as minimally invasive as possible or to cause the least amount of pain. And with Kina…

_Her connective tissue is weak…if they were to try to gut her the might kill her…_Crow was going to have to throw the fight. He could survive anything as long as they didn't need his heart or brain. If he lost his other eye he might even be able to get a robotic replacement. But Crow was too busy thinking to make the fight convincing. Before he knew it his blades were shattered and Kina was bearing down on him from out of the air, her Razor Wing poised and ready to carve into him. He was able to dodge at the very last second but he still got cut.

Kina was getting tired. It was getting harder to stand and to keep her blades out. If she wanted to survive the fight and the penalty she was going to have to win, but without hurting Crow to bad. But it still had to be believable. But how could she do that? He knees were shaking and with every bend of the knee they creaked and popped in protest and agony. She had five minutes left before she completely collapsed from the pain and exhaustion that was mounting.

Crow was behind her before she could blink and had knocked her into the edge of the arena, slicing her down her back. It had appeared greatly planned and the viewers enjoyed it immensely but it was an honest accident. But it isn't like it mattered. Kina recovered far more quickly than Crow expected her to. She instantly used the gaping gash to her advantage, creating a wing-like wall of blood that wrapped around Crow and allowed Kina to punch him hard enough in the stomach and ribs to make it impossible for him to continue fighting. After that, she collapsed.

The first thing she saw when she came to was the boring ceiling of her cell. It took a few seconds but everything suddenly came back to her and she flew up in bed, jarring a few muscles that would rather be left alone entirely.

"Whoa, calm down," it was Crow. He was still alive. The immense relief at hearing his voice was almost enough to make her pass out again. She looked around. In the corner of the room farthest from the bed there was a giant check for one million cast points, a trophy and a bouquet. There was also a pile of Candy and a pile of snack wrappers which could only have been Shiro's doing. Kina looked down at herself. She was whole, sore as hell, but whole. Then she realized her entire upper torso under her collar bone was wrapped in bandages. She pushed Crow off the bed and wrapped the blanket around herself.

"Hey! What the hell?! I wasn't looking," he said flailing his arms and huffing angrily. The look on her face was annoyed. "I didn't even bandage you! That psycho doctor did! I didn't even know you had been cut by me until they brought you back here!" She believed him, but still.

"Has the penalty round happened?" She studied Crow's face. There were no cuts, no stitches and nothing was missing. He had both ears and no incisions or stitches on his torso that she could see. Kina was confused. "Did they take anything?" Crow shook his head.

"I don't know how it happened but when she pulled the lever, the slots added up to a free pass." Kina's jaw dropped. She looked at Ganta who just shrugged. "Looks like we got a break, huh?" All Kina could do was nod.

The rest of the day passed without much incident. They were watching the news when they saw it. It was coverage of Kina's "trial". They were interviewing people in the community about her. Most people said that she was nice to them and unassuming, but there were others who said that they had always known she was insane and a killer. People told blatant lies about violent encounters with her. The faces of the people that had been killed in Kina's job were all slid across the screen and a few words were said about how they were great people, that they would be sorely missed and that Kina was where she belonged. The once jovial mood in the room was quickly destroyed and it never really came back entirely.

After dinner Ganta went to his room and Shiro left to do who knew what. Crow had moved from sitting on the floor by Kina's bed to sitting on it now that she had on a shirt over her bandages.

"Can I ask you something?" Kina was looking at the TV but it was obvious that she wasn't _seeing_ what was on the screen. Crow nodded. "Do you still…see their faces? Your friends I mean? Do you still see them…when you sleep?"

"Having nightmares?" She nodded. "I do. It used to be every night. Now it's only once in a while. When I see them now I see them how they were before…"

"How long did it take?" He shrugged. Kina was silent for a while. "Can I ask you for a favor?"

"Of course." Like she had to ask. She could ask him for the moon and he'd do his damndest to get it for her. "Can you stay here tonight?" She sounded pitiful. She sounded like a little girl. She didn't look at him but Crow knew she was close to tears.

"I'll stay. But I'm sleeping on the floor," he said, making a very weak attempt at humor. It worked. She chuckled and shook her head and leaned against him. She fell asleep relatively soon after that and after he made sure she was definitely asleep, he went to the mirror and stared at his reflection, at the initials tattooed on his head. _I never stop seeing them…_


	3. Chapter 3

Authors note: I'm pretty sure that I'll get rid of most of-if not all-of the grammar issues that have been plaguing my writing. Also, I've seen Yo-Yoh-You's name spelled all of these ways -_- So I'm going to spell it Yoh. Thank you to those who read it and just dealt with it, I really appreciate it ^_^ also, I am starting a contest of sorts! The readers will get to decide what miss crazy doctor is going to do to Crow, Kina or whoever else interferes. I'll take the best ideas, make a poll and let everyone vote on it. It's up to you :D Also the disorder I am describing is a real thing. It is something that I was born with and it does everything I say it does and then some. So please be kind when reading that and don't think it's just some fun lie I made up. This disease can ruin lives and bodies.

Ganta was up for another Carnival Corpse. And yet somehow, his friends knew who his opponent was before he did. But given Ganta's personality, it wasn't that surprising. And if he knew and had time to prepare it would make the show less interesting. Less interesting meant less money and less money meant that Tamaki would be beyond pissed. The day that Ganta was to fight, he had spent part of the morning with Kina and Crow, watching him train and learning more about Kina.

"What kind of illness do you have exactly?" It was something that Ganta had been trying to avoid. He just didn't feel right about prying into her personal life. And what if she got mad at him for asking? After all, some people didn't like talking about their health, but she didn't seem like that kind of person so he decided that it wouldn't be too much of a problem. "I mean , I just don't know anything about diseases and stuff-not that I'm saying you have a disease!"

Kina laughed as Ganta flailed around before finally just biting his lip and sitting on his hands. Shiro laughed too, even Crow seemed a little happier than usual although whenever he got caught being looked at his usual scowl was back in place, although slightly embarrassed because he'd been caught being "normal" instead of a fighting and strength crazed nut.

"It's a genetic disorder, classified as a syndrome. It's called ehlers-danlos and it can affect either of the cologne genes in someone's DNA. The form of it that I have is affecting both of my cologne genes. So it makes my connective tissue weak, like my ligaments and stuff. So my knee caps dislocate from the slightest provocation, my thumbs and all of my other fingers bend back at pretty gross angles, and I can turn my arm almost three hundred and sixty degrees, its closer to two hundred and ninety than three hundred and sixty." Ganta and Shiro stared.

"Can you do the arm thing?" Shiro asked, an excited smile plastered to her pale face.

"Well, I'm not really supposed to…but sure," she grinned a mischevious grin that made her look years younger.

"You know you're not supposed to," Crow said; Shiro pouted and mumbled the words 'kill joy'.

"I'm not supposed to do it _a lot_ and me doing it _once _isn't doing it _a lot _so it's fine," and before he could say anything else, Kina was rolling up her sleeve and planting the palm of her hand on the floor. Slowly she started to turn it clockwise and it moved unnaturally around until it was almost right back where it started. Ganta was amazed and Shiro squealed in excitement and Kina untwisted her arm. A few hours later, Ganta was leaving to go meet up with Yoh and Shiro bounded after him like a puppy. Kina smiled and sighed.

"They're so adorable."

"Don't let it fool you. Ganta's one hell of a fighter. He fractured my sternum with that Ganta Gun of his."

"Ganta Gun? You named it didn't you?" Crow ignored her comment. "So he's a strong fighter? I'd believe it, he's got a good spirit. And they're saying he killed his _entire_ class?" Crow nodded, Kina shook her head. "And people believed that?"

"People are dumb enough to believe anything. He's got a fight tonight, Woodpecker versus the Hummingbird. We should watch it," Kina was obviously uncomfortable with that option. She didn't want to watch Ganta fight. He was a kid, and even if he did have Branch of Sin he was still just a kid. A kid who could lose his life against some deranged killer who had Branch of Sin as well. Or worse, he could become a killer. Watching a child commit murder in the act of self defense was not something she wanted any part in.

"Look, he'll be fine. I've felt that kid's Branch of Sin and I know he'll win," well if Crow seemed so sure then there was nothing that she could really do. He wouldn't let her watch someone die if it was a real possibility.

When the fight was about to start Crow and Kina were sitting around a small TV, Kina having just taken her medicine and sitting wrapped in a heated blanket. Crow was behind her, a wall of support. When the spotlight in the arena was lit they could see Ganta standing in one corner. He looked even smaller and younger on the television. The light shifted ever so slightly and brought the challenger, the Hummingbird, into view.

It was a girl. She looked to be the same age as Ganta and had an innocent look on her face. Could they really be making children fight each other? Was this place really that demented?

_Of course it is_ she thought. The people in charge wouldn't be above making children fight, hell they probably endorsed it! Kina's stomach gave and uncomfortable lurch and as she watched, the fight began.

There were a few things that she started noticing as Ganta started moving. He leg was injured, he was limping on it. It was odd, when he left Kina's room he was completely fine. And the innocent look on Hummingbird's face did not last long. After a few minutes she looked like the most insane person Kina had ever seen. And the things she was saying-what in the hell? Ganta couldn't win this fight.

Hummingbird had a ranged Branch of Sin but it differed from Ganta's in the fact that she wasn't firing her blood. It stretched from her to Ganta and cut him deeply. Ganta couldn't get a shot in at all. But it wasn't like he had a chance. When he attempted to go on the offensive the fight was interrupted.

It was Yoh, Ganta's friend. He was yelling at him, saying that he didn't know that he was the kind of guy to hit a girl and that he couldn't hit her because she was his sister. How was the fair? Ganta's life was on the line! And Hummingbird was already kicking his ass. Hummingbird eventually ended up using her brother as a human shield, the gurads thought it was a good idea to let him intervene. Hummingbird was a heartless and callous girl, it was disturbing to see such ruthlessness from a child. But Ganta eventually one with a ridiculous headbutt that Crow actually cheered for.

It was so surprising that Kina jumped and fell over getting tangled up in the blanket.

"I told you that kid was a great fighter!," he said, probably more happy that he was right than the fact that Ganta had one. He was a simple man after all. And he didn't waste time getting up and trying to find Ganta to congratulate him on his win. An event that ended with a flower pot to the face and most likely a concussion and a fractured nose. Kina just smiled and patted Ganta on the shoulder.

"Way to go," Ganta beamed but after a moment a horrified look came over his face.

"The penalty game!" He was in a panic. Hummingbird was fine; sitting in her room she had a haughty look on her face.

"I've been through penalty games before. I've lost part of my stomach and a kidney, it's nothing,: but that was something that Ganta wasn't going to believe and he ran off trying to find someway to prevent or even stop the penalty game. And then he remembered Yoh. Yoh had been trying to buy his sister's freedom by buying up her sentence. Maybe they could do it now!

Ganta ended up in an odd room, it looked like a bar. Inside were two other Deadmen; the Owl and the Game Fowl. On the TV in the room the penalty game was being broadcast. As it happened the Owl pulled a small phone out of his mouth that was made up of three of his molars. After a few words he looked at the TV while Ganta started sweated and panicking. He was in for a surprise.

The option that came up was hair. Ganta's jaw dropped, the doctor started to lose her calm and started kicking the slot machine and yelling and Hummingbird started laughing. All Ganta could do was look at Owl and smile and thank him as many times as he could in a single breath.

Did this person have something to do with Crow rolling a free pass on the slot machine? Maybe this was someone to be relied on, someone who could help him and Crow and Kina when they needed it. At the very least he had helped Ganta once. He helped to potentially save a life. But there are something that can't be fixed with a phone call and well connected friends.

Kina was making her way back to her room, Crow's forehead bandaged and a grumpy scowl on his face. Sitting on the bed, covered mostly by the sheet, was a small box with Kina's name on it. Crow didn't see it and when Kina opened it. It slipped from her hands after a few seconds. After a few seconds Kina was over the toilet vomiting violently.

Crow walked to the fallen box and stared at what was at his feet.

It was a small fetus.


	4. Chapter 4

_There goes my meds…_ It was the only coherent thought that Kina was able to produce while she was vomiting. She threw up so much and with so much ferocity that it made her dizzy and her stomach ache. And the amount that was vomiting, she didn't recall eating that much. When she finally stopped she leaned against the wall but stayed on the floor. She couldn't find the energy to stand, or the will. What was she going to tell crow? What could she say? So that was what happened….how in the world did Deadman Wonderland get _it_?

Crow was still by the bed, by where it had fallen. She wondered-did he pick it up? Did he know what it was? Not in terms of science, he wasn't so stupid that he didn't know what a fetus was. But did he really know what it meant? Did he know when it happened? Of course, he had to. He didn't have horrible memory, not when it came to her. He remembered everything about her, even things she didn't want her to.

What did he think of her? Did he hate her? Did he hate it? The constant over thinking was starting to bring on an anxiety attack and Kina had another vomit attack. It was another ten minutes of off and on vomiting, she was sure that she was done and collapsed against the wall, a fresh sweat covering her face and a ashen cast so dark she looked to be an entirely different color. She was in massive amounts of pain, her shuddering breath was hint enough to Crow. But he felt glued to his spot.

The fetus was in a small tube, most of it glass, sturdy class, but the tops and bottoms were metal. And it was so cold that there were tendrils of what looked like frozen breath swirling off of it. It fit right in the center of Crow's hand. It was so small. It seemed too small to be real, too small to be alive. But it was-it had been-alive at some point. Alive and inside of a body that kept it safe. And then somehow, someway it was in this little tube, in Kina's room, in Crow's hand…and it was dead. Crow had killed; he killed more people than he cared to remember. The Carnival Corpse was a war where only one person could win. And usually incapacitating someone meant killing them. And some of those people had been innocent. There were people in DW that were innocent, that were arrested and convicted of crimes that they didn't commit. He was one of those people. But this…this small little fetus was as absolutely innocent as innocent could be. It hadn't even been born yet and its life had been snuffed out. Why?

"Kina…" Her heart lurched into her throat. He sounded so…not like him. He sounded sad, hurt, maybe even scared. It scared her and hurt her to her core. He was going to hate her, she knew it. He had to. He was going to hate her because of what she did. Hell, _she_ hated herself for what she did. But what else was she supposed to have done? "Kina?" He was behind her now. She didn't move, she didn't turn, she didn't even act as if she heard him. Then his hand was on her shoulder, squeezing, almost hard enough to hurt but just shy of it. And the waver in his voice, she couldn't look. Seeing it was bad enough, she didn't want to imagine what his face like with his voice so weak and broken.

Ganta rushed into the room bursting with excitement and yelling as he came into the room. "The Pentaly Game-it didn't go wrong! She didn't get hurt!" He opened his mouth to say more but when he saw Crow standing in the doorway of the bathroom and Kina sitting on the floor with his hand on her shoulder, he closed his mouth abruptly and just stood there for a second. They didn't seem to have heard him. He took a few silent steps closer to them and when he saw what was in Crow's hand his stomach flipped.

"Crow…wh-what's in your hand? Why do you have that?" Silence greeted his questions.

"Kina, what happened?"

"Don't."

"Look at me."

"No." Her voice was steely and hard. It didn't sound right coming out of her body. Crow's hand tightened, still not enough to hurt but how long was that going to last? Not long. He used his single hand to turn her around; Ganta rushed from the room and shut the door. This was yet another event that Ganta had no right to see. He couldn't help it the first time. But now he could and he made sure to run back to his room as quickly as possible.

Kina didn't know what she expected but it wasn't what happened. Crow removed his hand from her shoulder and sat in front of her. He put the little tube with the fetus in it on the floor between them and then grabbed her hands, keeping the both of them so tight in his own that there was no way she could have pulled them away. No matter what.

"What happened?" She shook her head and made sure to keep her head down. She was shaking and her hands were hot. "Tell me," she shook her head again. She felt like a child. Not like she was being punished, but small, insignificant and totally lacking in control. As if anything in the world would be able to tear her apart because of how week she was. And he hadn't even said the word 'fetus' yet. He'd barely said anything. He squeezed her hands even tighter. It hurt a little.

"I don't know Senji, I don't know," and she was crying. Right as she opened her mouth a torrent of tears ran down her face and the hopeless confusion that coated her voice was terrifying to hear. All she could say what 'I don't know'. Over and over for a few minutes, ' I don't know'. Crow was shocked to say the least. His grip on her hands slackened out of shock and she covered her face, her fists balled and pushing into her eyes.

Crow didn't know what happened but he knew that DW was the cause of it. And _that_ told him all he needed to know. Even though it had been eight years and nothing had ever come of it, he couldn't, and hadn't forgotten what happened.

He didn't want to blame it on beer but sadly, it did have a huge part to play. Senji had graduated from the Police Academy and Kina had watched the entire ceremony and thrown a party at her house for him and all of his other friends. Everyone he knew was there, including the people that he would be working with the closest. The party had gone on almost all night but at around three in the morning everyone had decided to go home. Just about everyone left in a cab because they were drunk off their asses and would wake up the next day with a raging hangover and next to no memory of the party.

Kina had cleaned happily, making sure Senji stayed seated since the party was in his honor. It wouldn't be right to make the guest of honor clean up the mess. As far as being eighteen went that had to be the best night of his life. And after Kina was done cleaning she joined him on the couch, stretched out with her legs in his lap and they watched TV for another hour. It was the most natural feeling in the world, after all it was how they spent most of their days. He was always at her house, always on her couch and always watching TV. But they didn't usually drink. But it was a celebration!

"Here, nice and cold," She handed him a bottle of beer and has one for herself. Both are freezing and both are very strong. More hard liquor than beer. And they both drank happily, Kina little less happily that Senki. She made a face and he started laughing.

"You're such a lightweight," he laughs and keeps drinking, handling the alcohol like it was nothing. Kina sipped her's more cautiously, making a face almost every time and eventually giving up and putting the bottle on the table. This illicited more laughter from Senji and she punched him playfully.

After that, all of the memories of that night were broken up into little splashes of color and shapes. He didn't remember getting to the bedroom or falling asleep that night. But he did remember having sex and waking up next to her with a fuzzy feeling in his mouth and the most content feeling he'd ever known in his life. And to his shock, which made him feel bad, Kina had woken up and instead of looking disgusted or upset, she smiled and laid her head on his chest. And they stayed like that for hours until hunger finally drove them from bed.

Neither one of them had worried about the lack of protection. When Kina was ten she'd had an accident that a damaged her uterus so badly that every doctor told her that she would never have children. And she believed them wholeheartedly. She had seen the images of her uterus that the doctors had taken with a fiber optics camera. It looked destroyed, like a bomb had gone off near it. So why should they worry?  
A few weeks later, Senji was in her house, on her couch watching TV when she told him she was pregnant. And instead of being mad, she was unbelievable surprised. The fear had set in shortly after the surprise but Senji had done his best to crush it. He was a cop, he was making good money and there was no doubting that their relationship would change, they were both what the other person was missing and nothing was going to change that. Kina handled it better than he thought she would, and to his surprise, the fear he had felt hadn't been at the fact that she was pregnant, but at the fear of anything negative happening to his child.

After eight weeks, Kina had collapsed into his arms, sobbing. She woke up covered in blood and when she went to the doctor, the fetus was gone. She had started miscarrying during the night and it didn't stop until she woke up. Her body had already expelled the fetus. At least that was what she had been told.

The proof of that lie was sitting in between them. In a little glass and metal coffin.

The rage that Senji felt was so great that he couldn't see straight. This place and it's evil had tainted everything good in his life. His job, his relationship with Kina, and the life of their unborn child. He felt so sick that the rolling in his stomach was audible. And Kina had gone from 'I don't know' to I'm sorry. But not to him, to the baby they had never known. He was sorry too, more sorry than he had ever been in his life.

And he was going to make everyone pay. If he had to bleed them dry one drop at a time, he would make them pay.


	5. Chapter 5

Crow's next Carnival Corpse was an absolute blood bath. Not only did his opponent die in a more gruesome fashion than what was expected of Crow, but there were so many guards that were killed outside of the arena that the floor was covered in blood. There was nowhere anyone could set down their foot and not come away with it covered in blood. Crow had murdered them all with violent abandon. His usual cocky attitude was replaced by a hated and anger so deep that it permeated the air around him. And his opponent could not have been a more perfect victim. It was so perfect that the only way it could have happened was the director trying to mess with him and Kina even further. His opponent was one of the Deadmen who wasn't in prison on trumped up charges. He was a murderer and a pedophile who tortured his victims after he violated them and the dismembered their bodies to send back to the family to hurt them even more. And his final insult would always be sending back the head with a tape in the mouth recording what he had done to their children and bragging about it; he even recorded the dismembering.

Crow tore him into pieces without a second thought. And he drew it out, doing to him what he had done to countless children. He cut off the guy's arms and legs and poked him full of holes slowly, then he stuck his 'Crow Claw' back inside the holes and slowly cut them open, shredding him and butchering him with as much rage as his body could manage without self destructing. When he was done his skin and hair color couldn't be seen under all of the blood. When he walked into Kina's room it was after he had showered for over an hour and he was raw from scrubbing. The fetus and it's little tube were still in the room, back in the box and sitting on the bed where it had initially been left. Kina hadn't slept in her bed since the day it had shown up. It had been there for three days solid. She slept on the floor on the other side of the room up against the wall as far away from it as she could get.

Crow had adopted the habit of opening the box and just looking at it. He didn't pick it up and he didn't talk. He just watched it and was torn up inside by it. He didn't think he could be hurt anymore, not by anything. He knew that Kina had been as safe as possible on the outside and that was the biggest of his worries. And then he met Ganta but after experiencing his power first hand he was positive he had nothing to worry about when it came to him. Everything was easy. All he had to do was fight. He could train all he wanted and get stronger and stronger and having the chance to regularly test his strength was almost an enjoyable experience. And almost in a sane kind of way. But he had enjoyed it nonetheless, even though he knew it meant he was starting to go insane.

And then he stopped getting letters and then Ganta brought Kina into his room. He was still going insane but it wasn't the same anymore. He was going insane with worry. Kina was ill; she could barely walk some days. And then she was a Deadman so of course she'd be forced to fight even though she was one of the gentlest people he had ever known. But he had found a way to deal with that. He went right back into his role as her protector. And it was something that he had missed, even if he didn't know it. He missed feeling needed and needed by her. Everything had a normal feeling to it. And then this…fetus situation happened. And it threw everything into a fiery downward spiral that yanked away any sense of normal that Crow had fought to gather. It showed how far Deadman Wonderland's reach really was.

It had been eight years since Kina's pregnancy and apparent miscarriage. To have the fetus thrown back into their lives in a tube that had an identification number on it, showing that it was being used for twisted experiments was just another dagger in the chest. And Crow was beginning how many he could take. But what he worried about the most was Kina. She had broken down when she saw the fetus. Shattered. He thought she had dealt with the miscarriage, thought that she had gotten help. She seemed okay after a few months. She had to burn the sheets and buy a new mattress even though he'd been able to get the blood out. But he thought it was part of her healing. But the way she broke down, she hadn't handled it at all. She had just buried it as deeply as she could. Did he blame her?

Although he had been heartbroken over it too, he had managed to find a way to deal with it. But looking back at it now, it hadn't been the best way to handle it. His 'handling' of it had caused his insane aversion to any indecency that he perceived. After all the death of an innocent child was as indecent as almost anything could be. And if sex with him had caused Kina to miscarry then wasn't that indecent as well? And didn't _that_ mean that _any_ contact with a female was indecent as well?

Looking at it now, he had been childish and stupid. After Kina miscarried he hadn't touched her again. He would always panic at her clothing even though it was just jeans and a regular t-shirt. Never anything that showed copious amounts of skin. But he was stubborn in his childish thoughts and before he knew it, Kina had changed as well. She started wearing baggy clothes and giving him a lot of distance. Their relationship had warped into some weird joke of what it used to be. He went from crashing on her couch and sharing her bed; holding her during thunderstorms and watching scary movies, to never touching her and jumping if she was more less than two feet from him.

Did youth really make him that stupid? Of course it had. And he knew it but he had done nothing to change it. Just the thought of what he had done to them made him want to run his hand through a wall and his head through cement. And now was when he was realizing it. Not when she needed him the most, hell not when he needed _her_ the most. Only when the wounds had found a way to heal and turn to scars and then were suddenly ripped open and burned. That was when he came to his senses. Eight years of hiding behind youth's idiocy.

Looking at that fetus, he realized that if that baby had come to term, he would have been a horrible father. He was too young to see when he was being stupid, to see when he was being irrational. To see when he was making mistakes. The fetus was the culmination of all of his potential failure wrapped up in an innocent package.

He couldn't take it. He turned away from the fetus walked towards a wall, and put his hand through it. Kina yelped in surprise and shock and ran over to him.

"What are you doing?"She was yelling and pulled his hand out of the wall to examine it. "You broke it! What the hell Senji!" she rushed into her bathroom and pulled out a first aid kit. His hand was bloody and torn to pieces. She grabbed cotton balls and alcohol and started cleaning the blood and then set to work stitching all of the lacerations closed. He was surprised at the steadiness of her hands. Even more surprised by the fact that she didn't hit him even though he was pretty sure she wanted to. He mumbled a weak apology and let her stitch his hands shut. When she was done stitching his hand she hit him right in the face. Her eyes were teary and red and she was sniffling trying not to cry.

He had hurt her again.

"What's wrong with you Senji?"

"I just did more growing in the last twenty minutes than I have in the last twenty six years of my life." She looked up at him confused. He never realized how tiny she was. She hadn't been that close to him since she hugged him on the day he learned she was there. She was so small, like a doll.

"I'm sorry for scaring you, I didn't mean to. Do you think you can cast my hand?"

"Well, I mean, the kit has the stuff for it but I'm not a doctor. I could set it wrong and your hand wouldn't heal right."

"I'm sure it'll be fine. And I trust you a hell of a lot more than that crazy bitch doctor." So she grabbed the cast supplies from out of the kit and set his hand and casted it. It took longer than she would have liked but like Kina said, she wasn't a doctor. After the cast dried she found a sling in the first aid kit and made Senji wear it, making it as comfortable as possible.

"You need to sleep in your bed tonight." She didn't say anything and he knew she wouldn't. "I'll move it, put it somewhere you won't see and make sure that it doesn't affect you at all." She was silent for a moment. Senji didn't know what she was going to say, if anything at all.

"We should name it…bury it…keep it away from them." Surprise didn't describe what he was feeling. Shock was better. "It…doesn't have a gender but…we should name it and bury it somewhere that they'll never find it. It'll be happier that way." Senji smiled. Really smiled. It was a great idea, something he wished he'd thought of. But, of course Kina would think of it. She was brilliant in every way.

They waited until it was dark, the box with the fetus buried in an interior pocket of Senji's coat. They found Ganta and asked him if Shiro could lead them a secluded spot that no one would know about. It didn't matter if it was on the Grounds of DW, they knew they wouldn't be able to get it off. But as long as it was somewhere that no one else would find then they would be happy with it.

She led them deep underground to a place that they were positive no one had any knowledge of. Ganta had told her that once they got there she was to turn her back, leave them alone and wait until they told her they were ready to go. Until then she wasn't supposed to do or say anything or watch. And Shiro did just as Ganta had instructed. She led them deep underground and then stood at the mouth of the tunnel she used to get there. She stood perfectly still and waited patiently drifting into a daydream.

Crow and Kina walked to a far end of the underground cavern to an area where exposed geodes were strewn about the ground. They were all sorts of colors and had an odd sense of beauty around them; even though they were hard and could be dangerous they were still beautiful. They found an area where they formed a circle and dug a hole deep enough to deter anyone from trying to dig the box back up. So deep that no one would ever find it. But they didn't put the box in when they were done. They still hadn't picked a name.

"What do you think it would have been?" It was the first thing that Kina had said the entire time they had walked.

"A girl, definitely a girl."

"So we'll give it a girl's name."

"What about Hikaru?" It seemed perfect. For once he was able to think of something that wasn't absolutely imbecilic. Kina smiled and nodded and they put the box in the hole and covered it with dirt, packing it tight. They didn't say anything though, not really. There wasn't anything they could say for the baby they had never known. But it didn't feel right not saying anything.

It was Kina who spoke first. She crouched down by the hole and looked silently before she opened her mouth.

"I love you, Hikaru," it seemed so simple but it was so heavy and there was so much weight behind it. And as Kina said those words she sat up a little straighter, she seemed a little lighter. Crow sat down beside her and held her hand, squeezing it. They were words he'd never spoken but not words he didn't know. But he didn't know if he _could_ say them.

If he couldn't say it to Kina how could he say it to Hikaru?

Because he had to. Because her grief was his grief and her pain his pain.

"I love you."

When they got back to Kina's room she fell onto the bed and curled up into a ball. Shiro had bounced off to find Ganta the instant they had gotten back.

"You okay?" she nodded. "You sure?" She nodded.

"I feel…better. But I'm still so angry." A wicked smile flashed across Crow's face.

"Don't worry. Revenge is something I'm good at."

"Like what you did to that pedophile?"

"Oh that's just the beginning. I've got an entire plan for these bastards."Kina smiled. Although she couldn't support wanton murder and violence, this was something she could get behind. It wasn't wrong to do to them what they had been doing to innocent people. It was about time they got a taste of their own medicine.

Crow climbed into bed next to Kina and she curled up next to him, using his shoulder as a pillow. The normalcy was back. It felt so amazing. Lying on a prison bed, a prison cell, with the horrible reality of prison around her, Crow felt grounded for the first time in eight years. He felt like _Senji Kiyomasa _and not _Deadman Crow_. He felt whole.

He rolled over onto his side and kissed Kina for the first time in eight years. It was the best moment of his life. And he was going to cling to it. And shed a little blood along the way.


	6. Chapter 6

Crow had earned a new nick name around the grounds of DW. It was the 'Guard Killer'. Apparently there were many, many guards that had crazily shady pasts. And that was something that Crow couldn't let go unattended. After all, the people who ran DW weren't going to actually make sure that the people they were hiring good people. They hired any shmoe without a background check and gave them weapons to use on prisoners how the guards "saw fit." Obviously their ideas of what necessitated violence were vastly different from the inmates they beat.

But today Crow was taking a back seat to the violence. It was Kina's turn at a Carnival Corpse. Although he hated the idea of her fighting, he knew that during their fight she was holding back. Thankfully the people who paid to watch didn't know much about her powers so it looked like Crow had lost trying to be a gentleman. Obviously he was, and he had fully intended on loosing but it wasn't an act entirely. She did get the best of him. She was fast and calm and got the drop on him way easier than he would have liked. It was something that had been nagging at him but he was too proud to say anything about her beating him. His ego couldn't take it.

Ganta and Shiro were in the room, sitting on the floor extremely anxious. Well Ganta was, Shiro was excited to see what Kina was capable of doing. Everyone had gotten a small glimpse of her abilities beforehand but now, when she didn't have to worry about actually hurting someone, they were sure it would be an entirely different show.

As they watched the small TV screen the spotlight in the arena found Kina. She looked hollow but not sickly. It was a different kind of hollow. Like she was hiding something inside herself. And then Crow realized what it was. She was making herself a killer. She was burring everything in her that made her a nice person. And that made Crow wonder-why?

It wasn't like she had to do that to win. She was a fast person, always had been, and she was incredibly smart. She would be able to kill just about any of the other Deadmen without batting an eyelash. And that was while staying completely normal and happy. So for her to be burying everything pure about herself it could only mean one thing. She wanted to absolutely destroy whoever it was that she was fighting.

_How interesting_, he thought. He knew it wasn't necessarily right but it was exciting for him to think about her completely destroying somebody. He knew it would be artful, masterful, and more likely than not, very sexy. He had forgotten how she could be while enraged or excited over something. He felt more shame for forgetting, mostly because he _could_ forget something about her. But it was coming back to him. And now he was wondering how he would handle watching her tear someone to shred while being turned on by it.

The spotlight moved and found her opponent. Ganta balked-it was Hummingbird. The announcer played up the fact that both of the Deadmen were girls. He made a bunch of girl on girl jokes but when the fight actually started no one expected what they saw.

It wasn't that Kina lost, that couldn't be farther from the truth. Kina dominated the round from the get go. But it was the ferocity with which she was fighting. Her body was on autopilot and it was a bloody, gory thing of beauty. Her Branch of Sin-Razor Wing, was extravagant when not confined. It really did look like she had wings coming from her arms and like she could have flown away at any moment. And for a while she _did _look like she was flying. She was over Hummingbird's head and behind her, then beside her and avoided Hummingbird's Whip Wing like it was nothing. She danced around the arena before ending the fight with a violent strike that would bleed Hummingbird out almost completely. But there was still something everyone wanted to know. Why? Why was she going after her so viciously? What history did the two of them have? Maybe Kina just didn't like crazy people? Crow didn't that was for sure.

Hummingbird was screaming and thrashing on the stretcher as the guards held her down. She spit strings of obscenities that made the grown men startle. It was honesty disgusting to hear. Kina rolled her eyes but they didn't look hollow and dead any more. They were alive and annoyed. Hummingbird kept fighting the guards and yelling every nasty thing that came into her head. Kina walked over to her and looked down at her as if she were looking at a pile of foul smelling garbage. And then in the blink of an eye curled her hand into a fist and slammed in straight into Hummingbird's face. Her nose shattered instantly and spurted blood everywhere. Hummingbird was unconscious so she didn't feel anything. The guards that had been holding Hummingbird on the stretcher dropped both of them and instantly tried to scramble to get out of Kina's way. Instead of walking over or around Hummingbird, she nudged her out of the way with her boot, giving her an unceremonious toe to the stomach and rolling her out of the way. After that she just walked out and headed for her room.

Crow, Ganta, and Shiro were all walking to meet her when there was a crash. The sound of graning metal and shattering concrete resonated throughout G-block. Everyone ran to the sound of it. Ganta got their last but was the first to realize what was going on. At least he thought he had.

_It's the red man_ he though, positive he was going to pee himself right then and there. But then he looked, really looked and noticed that although similar to the Red Man that had killed his friend, this person's outfit was a little different here and there. And it wasn't red. It was black and grey like a storm cloud.

There were bodies scattered everywhere. The people that were still alive or uninjured enough to run were doing so. They left their wounded and dying friends where ever they lay and ran for their lives.

Kina was stuck underneath some rubble that had fallen and pinned not only her but a few other people. The odd creature that was standing there with a sick grin on it's face and it opened it's mouth. Instead of words or even intelligible noise, it hissed heavily, like an evil snake and what looked like steam poured out of it's mouth. Followed by a stream of wiggling, pointed streams of blood.


	7. Chapter 7

Ganta was terrified. More than one Red-Man? How in the hell was that possible? How could there be another person who was so warped and evil? And what did he want with Kina? Ganta's legs were frozen with sheer terror. He turned his head and thought about asking Crow if he knew anything about what was going on but Crow was no longer beside him. He was cutting rubble with his Branch of Sin and flinging it off of Kina while she struggled herself to get free. Crow looking almost panicked but there was no fear in Kina's face, just absolute rage. Her shirt was torn almost completely so while Crow dug her free she pulled it off of herself and wrapped it around her hair; using it almost like a bow to pull her hair up and away from her face. When Crow got the last piece of rubble off of her she sprang to her feet and lunged at the second Red-Man, slamming her fist into the exposed portion of his face.

_It's not another Red-Man. He's black,_ but the more Ganta looked, the more he realized that this wasn't true. He wasn't black. There was something about his clothing that was absorbing all of the color around him. Like he was a black hole.

The entire time Crow had been trying to save Kina from the debris the creature-Ganta wouldn't call him a person- had stepped back and watched, cocking its head to the side. Like it didn't understand what was going on. When Kina slammed her fist into his face there was a nauseating crack, broken bones no doubt. The 'thing' floated away, it could fly just like the Red Man. Ganta sank to his knees and stared with tears in his eyes, bred from terror and the feeling of utter uselessness. He couldn't help Kina fight this thing; he was pissing himself at the thought.

Crow was right behind Kina after she punched _it_ in the face. Although _it_ had floated away, he managed to get the edge of his blade to rake across the thing's chest. Not like it mattered much-there was a metal plate underneath his clothing that covered his entire chest. _It _hissed angrily and opened its mouth. Once again there was a wriggling tendril of blood coming from the back of its throat. But it wasn't like that for very long. Within seconds it had hardened, developed a point and was flying right at Kina and Crow.

The next second the two had shattered the 'mouth blade'. Crow's 'Crow Claw' was thin and extended, the honeycomb pattern in it empty, allowing him to use the same amount of blood but reach a farther target. Kina on the other hand had three blades coming out of her forearms, two massive ones coming from her back, and a single blade coming out of the palm of both of her hands. All of them, including the ones on her back were crossed in front of her, and the thing's blood was lying in massive splatters on the floor. _It _wasn't happy about being thwarted.

The sound that it made was an ungodly one, it turned Ganta's stomach and it raised goose bumps on Kina's arms. It was similar to the sound a severely wounded and dying animal would make if it was choking through a broken neck and a compromised trachea filled with blood. And there was a sound mixed in with it, like manufacturing equipment. It was a horrible thing to hear. As it was making this horrible noise, it lunged at Crow and Kina with multiple blood weapons pouring from its mouth. It scratched the two of them as they rushed out of its way and was too far away for either of them to attack when they had regained their balance. They weren't bleeding severely but it was bad enough that _it_ had even touched them.

Kina growled low and feral in her throat and ran after the floating creature and jumped off of a pile of rubble and angled all seven of her blades at its face. She was traveling very quickly and ended up stuck to a wall-all of the blades found purchase in a stone wall instead of a soft, fleshy target. The thing had suddenly shot up into the air; clear out of Kina's reach, and was gone, crashing through the ceiling. Kina growled angrily and ripped her blades out of the wall and dropped to the ground. She didn't land gracefully, she didn't land on her feet, and she landed dangerously close to a pile of rebar out of a wall but she didn't seem to care. She set to work angrily hacking the rubble to pieces.

There was anguish in every slice and she was wailing-it was hard to hear over to crying and droning of the wounded and dying. Crow was at her side almost instantly and almost got hacked up by her blades. Ganta was too far to see if she was crying; he assumed she was. The only thing that he was sure of was that he was –somehow-more terrified of this new Red Man-esque creature than he was of the Red Man himself.

Guards quickly flooded the room and started rounding up wounded and injured inmates and Shiro appeared behind Ganta, dropping out of a vent. He tried to stop crying but it wasn't any use. He managed to at least get to his feet and eventually his face dried. Crow had Kina wrapped in his coat and in his arms. He and Ganta both knew they needed to get out of the area as quickly as possible. Kina had potentially destroyed the ligaments in her feet by falling and was unconscious from lack of adrenaline. When they got back down to G-block Crow made sure the door was locked before sitting Kina in bed.

"What the fuck was that?" Ganta asked in a panic. Like Crow would know. He didn't have access to any kind of information unless it came from his magazine of if someone told him. Very rarely did he experience something that absolutely terrified everyone. "Is she okay?" Ganta walked over to Kina's bed. Her cheeks were flushed and tear stained. There were splashes of blood on her face and her skin and bra. She was pale and parts of her body, mainly her legs and ankles, were swollen. When she woke up she was going to be in massive amounts of pain.

"So was that fucker your red man?"

"Well no, but he's close. Just a different color and I've never seen him before," Ganta was feeling useless again. There was no information that he could give to Crow. He didn't really know how the Red Man fought enough to tell Crow because the first time they 'met' he had been knocked unconscious. And then the sudden appearance of this 'thing' was so odd. Kina was so angry at it, which instantly made Crow angry at it. But why? How was it connected to her?

And then it hit him. He must have been Kina's 'Red Man'. He must have been the person who killed all her friends and had her framed for it and sent to Deadman Wonderland. Was there a whole army of those monsters? The very idea of that made Ganta's stomach churn and sweat bead on his forehead.

_No, that's not it,_ he thought. An army of those monsters would surely be almost impossible to control. They'd go on a rampage in a heartbeat if given the chance.

"But maybe, they are the same thing, but not the same person," Ganta didn't like using that word but it was the only one that he could think of at the time. "I think, maybe he's what got her sent here. The Red Man killed my friends and ended up here. So maybe he killed her friends and she ended up here the same way," Crow looked pensive and before he or Ganta could say anything else, Kina groaned and rolled from her back onto her side. Her face turned white and then an ashy grey color. She was due for her pain medication.

And Makina was already at the door, medication in hand. The same business-only look was plastered to her face. She ignored Ganta and Crow and walked over to Kina and offered her a small cup of water and three pills. Kina took them without a word or complaint and Makina made her roll over and examined the swelling on Kina's body. It was evident that she was not pleased. But whether or not it was with Kina or not was something that could not be gleaned from looking at her face.

"You two," she turned in a tight circle and acknowledged them for the first time. "Make sure she doesn't get out of bed or put weight on either of her legs. If she has to go to the bathroom then you are to carry her to and from, understood?" She was looking at Crow. He didn't nod or give any indication that he had heard her but Makina seemed convinced he had. She looked at Ganta but said nothing and left the room.

Shiro reminded them that she was there by walking up to Kina's bed and setting something down on the table. It was a little cup of pudding that she had no doubt been saving for herself. Ganta smiled and Kina gave her a weak smile. Shiro even covered her with a blanket and fluffed her pillow.

"I'm going to go get more snacks!" Shiro found a vent in the room; took of the grate and shimmied inside, putting the grate back in place behind her. Crow sat on the foot of the bed and seemed to be deep in thought.

"How do you know that thing?"

"He killed my friends. And that's why I'm here," the pain in her voice was horrible. Neither Ganta nor Crow wanted to her to speak. "I didn't think he would be here. But I know he is, and now I know I can kill him here. And Minatsuki too."

"Why did you beat the shit out of her exactly?" It was Crow who asked. Even with everything that had happened; he still was curious about it. And it was better than sitting there talking about the monster that had her framed for murder. "It looked like you were going to kill her."

"She likes to run her mouth about things she has no knowledge of. So I want to try to beat that out of her. I'm doing her a favor." It was obvious that that was all she was going to say about it. She curled up under the blanket and closed her eyes. There were already deep purple shadows under her eyes. Crow looked at Ganta, got up, and walked over to a corner of the room and called him over.

"I'll help you kill that Red Man of yours. But in return you are going to help me kill that thing, understood," there was no wavering in Crow's voice. He was terrifyingly serious and Ganta nodded. After that, Crow left the room. Maybe to go wreck the rec room again, maybe not. All Ganta knew was that he didn't envy anyone who got in Crow's way.


	8. A preview of things to come

"Senji, I love you. You know I love you and you know I'd do anything for you. I'd kill for you, I'd die for you. But don't you ever think I'll let you kill yourself!" The sound of Kina's small open hand against Crow's cheek resonates in the small room. And everyone cringes. Except Ganta. He can't find it in him to feel, or feel enough to react to what's just happened. From a haze he watches as Kina comes out of the self-imposed cocoon that she's been hiding in. The red mark that blooms across Senji's face is almost as angry as Kina is. It's been months and the first thing that breaks through and shatters her carefully crafted shell is anger. A desperate anger. It radiates from her like the heat from the sun. And everyone can feel the tension in the room.

It's swallowing up every person and every thought. No one knows if there will only be one victim of Kina's anger or if all of them are in for some type of assault. Slowly the tension condenses and it concentrates in a tight aura around Kina and Crow. It's almost like you can see the energy wafting and waving around them. Then, like a whirlwind, Kina just explodes. And there are many victims of it. All of them deserving, and all of them need it. No one raises a hand to defend themselves as she goes around the room verbally assaulting and sometimes physically attacking, the people in the room.


	9. Chapter 8

Makina was back in Kina's room within the hour. Once again she ignored both Crow and Ganta; apparently it didn't matter if inmates shared rooms down in G-block. Or Makina really didn't give a shit. That was a more believable train of thought. She brought a box with her on her second trip and helped to sit Kina up against the wall behind her bed. She was actually very gentle with Kina and it shocked both Crow and Ganta into stunned silence instead of furious and confused silence.

She rolled Kina's pant legs up and Kina hissed. Her ankles were extremely swollen and bruised. They looked extremely painful. Makina opened the box and pulled out two braces and strapped them onto Kina's ankles. After that Makina put casting material on both ankles. She seemed to be trying to be gentle but there's only so much pressure you can _not_ use when applying a cast and actually expect the material to stay. She wrapped Kina's ankles securely and when the cast was dry Makina put two walking casts on her feet.

"I don't have to tell you that we assume your ankles are broken. But not enough to where you need to stop walking; just be careful. I'm going to be upping your medication for the next six weeks."

"So was this that doctor's idea?"

"No. She most likely would have let you shatter and destroy your legs," the tone in Makina's voice was sheer irritation. Kina chuckled.

"Well good looking out Makina; thanks," she smiled and Makina huffed. But it wasn't the kind of sound one made when they were annoyed or mad or about to scold someone. It was like she was embarrassed. Ganta looked at Crow confused. Crow looked twice as confused and just shrugged at him. Makina cleaned up the mess caused by the casting material and let the room, saying she would be back in four hours for Kina's next dose of meds and ignored the two males as she left the room.

"Since when are you and the chief warden all buddy-buddy?" Crow asked incredulous and sat next to Kina, taking care not to bump or nudge her legs. She just shrugged and tried to lie down but the walking casts made her movements awkward. And she was still in Crow's coat with no shirt and a bloodstained bra on underneath. Ganta was amazed and proud of Crow-that was hilarious to him-for the fact that Crow was not only _not_ freaking out over Kina showing so much skin, but that he didn't seem to notice it at all! He was functioning like she was completely clothed! Ganta was going to have to say something to Crow later on.

When he saw Crow look away and pull his coat tight around Kina's front Ganta sighed and shook his head. Kina scowled at him and smacked his hand away and opened the coat back up. Crow proceeded to yell and rant about how Kina needed to have self-respect and cover up-especially in the presence of a minor. Kina didn't like being told what to do and instead of just yelling at Crow and shoving him or even just ignoring him she did something that he would never be ready for, never in a million years.

She managed to get up on her knees, maneuver around the walking casts and perch herself in front of him. Ganta was positive he knew what was coming and Crow's yell and graceless fall and scramble from the bed proved him right. Kina perched herself as close to Crow as she could get and opened the coat as wide as it would go and pushed her chest at Crow. He was beet red and on the verge of having a massive nose bleed. Kina laughed at him hysterically.

Crow grumbled and scrambled to his feet and got to the farthest part of the room he could. Ganta looked away so that he wouldn't see Kina exposing herself. IF she kept her bra was still on was a mystery to him and he didn't want to find out. But thankfully Kina wrapped herself up in Crow's coat, still laughing a bit, a laid down and curled up under the blanket.

"Bet you won't try to tell me how to dress anymore." Crow didn't respond, only scowled and blushed angrily. But he didn't stay annoyed for very long, although he did make sure that Kina was completely covered before he went anywhere near her. And a few hours later, Makina was back in the room and giving Kina pain medication and checking the swelling in her legs. She didn't seem worried by what she saw so that was a good thing. After that Kina slept off and on throughout the night.

"I'm gonna go back to my room," Ganta yawned. He was exhausted and he'd been feeling it slowly as the day droned on. Crow grunted in a noncommittal fashion and watched as Ganta left the room.

Crow didn't know what to do with himself. He was tired but he didn't feel like he could sleep; there were a million things going through his mind. This weird Red Man version two and his being responsible for Kina being thrown into prison. And Kina breaking her ankles fighting it and then the weird relationship that she had with the Chief Warden. She was so angry earlier and so hell bent on trying to kill that thing that she hadn't cared about what the end result of her actions would be.

She was a completely different person that the Kina that he had grown up with. She had been an inferno of rage and was using her Branch of Sin to her highest ability. She was almost like a different creature in her fighting, just like when she was fighting Minatsuki-she had been a beautiful creature made of nothing but power and willpower. He had never seen that side of her; he didn't know it existed and he wanted to see it again.

He felt bad for that-wanting to see her lose control again. But it wasn't that she had lost control in the usual sense. She lost control of her humanity and became something that lived for violence and accomplishing its goal. It was like she had temporarily killed the old her and the one that took over was a burning angel. He found himself even more attracted to her for that, and that wasn't something he was proud of or happy about. He was actually angry with himself.

Just because he had tried to bury the only Senji didn't mean he wanted Kina to do the same, at any point and for any reason. The Kina that he had known and loved and still loved wasn't any avenging angel. She was a sweet girl with an extraordinarily large heart. Sure, she could kick ass if she needed to and if someone needed sense beat into them she was the first person to do it. Just because he was a cynical monster who enjoyed ripping people to shreds didn't mean he wanted that for her. And he damn sure didn't want to see that happen to her. But it was, and he liked it. And that made him sick.

He kissed Kina's forehead and left a note saying that he was going to the rec room-something that he had been doing a lot more lately-and made sure that the door made as little noise as possible as he left. As he walked, he made a vow to himself.

No matter what it took he was going to put a stop to Kina compromising who she was because of Deadman Wonderland. He wasn't going to allow the Carnival Corpse to change her, or the second Red Man. He was going to shoulder all of her difficulties, all of her hardships, every last bit of it. And he was going to make sure that she went back to being her normal self. He was going to do whatever it took to take care of her like he used to and if that meant that he had to go back to his old self and not enjoy killing so much, and actually hate the fact he was in prison-go back to the Senji he had been when he was a cop-the he would do it. He loved her and no matter what he wasn't going to let this place destroy her-or him. Not anymore.


	10. Chapter 9

"Dammit Kina, would you sit down?" Crow was growing more and more irritated with Kina. She just refused to stay down. He didn't want to get in trouble with Makina, the woman was insane-but Kina wasn't making it easy to _not_ get in trouble. Kina just wouldn't sit down. When he walked into his room-he had forced her to move in with him so he could keep a better eye on her-she was standing in the center of the room doing Tai Chi. It was a ridiculous sight to see her going through the smooth, flowing movements with her feet wrapped in the walking casts. She looked at him and smiled but continued to go through her Tai Chi routine.

"C'mon Senji, I've torn most of the ligaments in my body like twice. Do you really think two fractured ankles are really going to prevent me from doing anything? You know me better than that."

"Yeah well I was hoping that you would have developed some common sense and stayed off of them regardless of how many injuries you've had before, now sit," he walked over to her, scooped her up and sat her on the bed. She frowned at him but only for a second. He had brought her a bag of snacks and Candy. It was something he had to make sure she ingested because as far as her constitution for foul tasting things went, it was pretty low and she had almost thrown the Candy up more than once. When she shoved it in her mouth and clamped her lips shut it was all she could do not to spit it right out.

Crow popped his in his mouth and didn't even flinch. He even chuckled at Kina. If she hadn't been preoccupied with not throwing up she would have thrown something at him. While she was –in his opinion-overreacting, he looked around his room at all of the changes that had taken place.

His desk that held his protein powder and handwritten workout schedule was against the wall to make more room for her to do Tai Chi and more room for him to do things like pushups. Also, instead of holding only his things, it had a few feminine touches to it. Kina liked flowers so there was a medium sized vase on the desk that had a few different flowers in it. He wouldn't admit it to anyone but he liked the flowers. They made everything smell better and it broke up the grey in his room like a happy bubble. On the walls were photographs that Kina had taken while she was on the outside. They weren't anything special to most people but to him they were amazing to him.

Some were landscape photos and he recognized every single place. She had taken pictures at all of their favorite places at sunrise and sunset, in the rain and in perfect weather. They were like little slices of home and all of them were very cherished treasures. Some were of animals, stray cats and dogs that she would feed around the neighborhood, pictures of the litters all of the strays had and then pictures of the strays after they had been fixed. The cones were hysterical and all of the animals looked pissed as hell. He wondered what would happen to them now that Kina was in prison. She had probably had them anonymously dropped off at an animal shelter with all of their papers.

Even his bed was different now. It was pushed up against a different wall, one that was away from the door and off in the corner. She had always hated being in front of doors, it caused her to panic for some reason; she felt like she had less protection than if she was hiding in the corner. Because of her, the sheets were a different color. He hadn't cared about the standard issue prison white and grey sheets but Kina did, even if she didn't say anything. The sheets in her room had been a pale blue color which confused him because he knew that her favorite color was purple. So when she moved in he told her that she could replace his sheets and he told her to pick whatever color she wanted-dropping massive hints that she had better choose purple. When Kina had come back from the commissary in a wheelchair with Ganta pushing it, and the purple sheets in her lap he felt proud of himself. He felt as if he had given Kina part of her normal life back.

She had only been living in his room permanently for about three weeks, half of the time it would take for her ankles to heal. And in that time he had made sure that there had been absolutely no incidents that would cause her to be angry or want to fight; he made sure that the only Kina she was during the day was the Kina that he had always known her to be. He also made sure that he kept a lid on his constant desire to want to shred someone to pieces and he made sure to keep his anger in check. He never realized how much got to him in prison. There were a lot of stupid things that he had let set him off; things that when he was free wouldn't have bothered him. At first he tried to blame it on the fact he was wrongly imprisoned but after a few days of it, it became very apparent that he couldn't blame it on that. He had just chosen to be an angry person-angrier than he used to be.

Sure the anger made the Carnival Corpse easier to deal with, and in the three weeks that she had been living in his room for, he had been in a Carnival Corpse once every week. Of course he won all of them with the same ferociousness that he had won with before but he wasn't drawing on his previously limitless reserves of anger anymore. He was drawing on his desire to be finished with the fight and get back to Kina as quickly as possible. While he would fight, Ganta and Shiro would keep her company until he came back. And when he got back he was always greeted by a room full of smiles and a massive hug and a kiss from Kina-the kiss wasn't ever more than a peck but he thought that might be because there were children in the room. He thought about testing that theory while the children were gone.

"Hey Senji, I have to go down for an X-ray today. Do you mind coming? I don't want to be alone with that crazy doctor bitch," Kina was using the blade that came out of her palms to itch her ankle. The cast had been driving her absolutely insane and she had been using the palm blade to itch it whenever she could. Usually she used a pencil because Crow didn't want her to cut herself open but the pencil never did a good job.

"Yeah I don't mind going, just stop itching with your blood, jeez," he grabbed a pencil and put it into her hand. She frowned at him and didn't use it but instead she got up and plopped herself into the wheelchair that was at the foot of the bed. Crow opened the door and pushed the wheelchair out. He was hoping for good news; something along the lines of Kina no longer needed to wear the walking casts or the actual casts either.

"Ah Kina, right on time," the doctor said as she spun around in her small desk chair. Crow hated doctor Rei considering she had been the one to yank his eye out of his head. He hated the idea of her even touching Kina but there really wasn't anything he could do. Doctor Rei gave Crow what was supposed to be a warm smile which he returned with an icy glare. "All right Kina hop up on the table for me and let's get this X-ray over with. Have you been staying off of your ankles?"

"Not really," Kina responded as she got onto the table and positioned her feet under the X-ray's 'eye'. "It's just too hard for me to stay still but I haven't done anything too stressful," the machine started whirring and there was a solid clunk as the first image was taken. The doctor walked over to the machine and put a second image slab into it and then took a second X-ray of Kina's ankles. Then she had her roll onto her right and left sides, taking two images each.

It took her ten minutes to develop the photos and she hung them up on the light screen so that Kina and Crow could both see them.

"Well, I'm going to have to stress to you how important it is that you don't stand unless you absolutely have to. I mean it, only if you're getting up off of the toilet. Those small fractures are well on their way to becoming complete breaks and I know you don't want that," Kina sighed but promised that she wouldn't put any weight on her legs unless it was an absolute necessity. After that, she scooted back into the chair and was told that Makina would meet up with them at some point going back to Crow's room so that she could give Kina her medication. And she was warned that if she didn't stay off her legs she was going to be in those casts for far longer than another four weeks-it had been upped because she just _had_ to do what she wanted.

Makina caught them as they were coming out of the infirmary and followed them to Crows room, giving Kina her medicine and asking what the doctor had told her. When Kina told her that she hadn't really been following instructions and had been standing when she wanted to Makina seemed generally annoyed with that information and gave Kina the look an annoyed mother would give a stubborn child. Crow kept out of the conversation but he couldn't help the obviously confused look on his face.

Makina was a bitch, everyone knew that. And she never showed any kind of kindness or concern to any of the inmates, it didn't matter if they were death row inmates or not. Crow couldn't begin to wrap his mind around what could have happened for her to show any compassion towards Kina.

When they got back to his room Makina stopped Crow outside the door as Kina rolled herself inside and pulled herself onto the bed.

"I thought I told you to carry her no matter what and to make sure she stayed off her feet."

"She doesn't listen to me!" he said defensively. Makina made a dissatisfied noise in her throat and closed her eyelids just enough to give Crow the feeling that she was going to hit him if he said anything other than "I'll try harder." Which he told her he would do and then rushed inside the room to get away from her and made sure he closed the door behind him.

"That is one scary bitch," he sat down next to Kina who had lain down on the bed.

"Eh, she's not so bad really."

"Maybe to you, she didn't just stare you down," Kina giggled and conceded that it was true that she hadn't ever really been on Makina's bad side before. She sat up and hugged Crow, thanking him for taking her down for her X-ray. It was an unnecessary thing to say but he accepted her thanks anyway. That was something that had always been a part of Kina. She had to thank people regardless of how small a kindness they had done for her. And when it came to accepting thanks herself she always acted like the act of helping was enough to sustain her. Crow had always wondered how she did that, how she was able to just want to help people she didn't know, even if it meant going very far out of her way. It was something that he himself was never capable of doing unless it was something to do with her. He had never been the kind of person to selflessly offer his services unless he was guaranteed to get something he wanted out of it.

"So are you going to stay off your legs _now_?"

"Yes, I promise. I'll only stand if I absolutely have to. But are you going to be okay carrying me to the bathroom multiple times a day?"

Crow huffed. "You weight like ten pounds, I'll have no problem carrying you," Kina laughed and leaned against his shoulder. Before she had a chance to get comfortable Crow moved himself against the wall and pulled her into his lap. It had been a very long time since he had done that and it surprised Kina to be moved around like a doll when she had no idea what was going on. But she didn't argue with it and snuggled into him as he wrapped his coat around her and left one of his arms wrapped around her. "See? Moving you is easy." Kina giggled again and mumbled the word 'show off'.

Kina closed her eyes and nodded off against Crow's chest. He turned the TV in the room on but didn't turn it up to where it would wake her up. After a few minutes of random channel surfing her found a martial arts movie and tried to pay attention to it but there was something nagging at the edge of his brain. He was wondering how much like the old days he could make their living situation.

He'd seen strays around the prison outside before. Maybe he could catch one and give it to her. There were things they could feed it that would be fine, even if it wasn't the correct food for a kitten or a puppy or a cat or a dog. He thought that she would really like that; she was the biggest animal lover he knew after all. And he had heard once, from Kina, that animals helped the healing process. Maybe if she had a little animal to cuddle with her all day when she hurt and to play with with toys and teach tricks, she would stay off of her legs the way she was supposed to.


	11. Chapter 1o

The squeal that came from Kina when she saw the sand colored, fluffy, six week old puppy in Crow's hand was so loud that it nearly shook the mirror she had on the far side of the room. The puppy barked and squirmed trying to get out of Crow's hands and he cringed from the sound. Ganta covered his eyes and Shiro jumped happily up and down clapping her mittoned hands.

"Thank you so much!" She held her hands out for the puppy, making sure to keep off her feet, and took the puppy from Crow and was instantly assaulted by the puppy's pink tongue. She was laughing like a little kid watching her new pet roll around on the bed. Crow groaned.

"Okay, rule one, no dog on the bed. He has his own," he pointed to a corner of the room and there was a dog bed, a water and food bowl, a pile of toys and a patch of grass sitting in a plastic container. Kina knew they sold just about everything in DW but she had no idea that they sold pet supplies. She had only seen on person with a pet and she never saw any of his pet items. Kina put the puppy down and he bounced around the room, heading straight for Crow's boots and untying the laces, growling and tugging on them, falling backwards and rolling around many times. "No! Dammit I got you your own toys!"

He scooped the happy little creature up and plopped him in the pile of toys. He was content to stay there and entertain himself with the toys instead of Crow's no ruined laces. Kina was laughing and grinning ear to ear and her face was flushed from the happiness she was feeling. Crow sat on the foot of the bed and pulled the laces from his boot and grumbled and Kina leaned over and hugged him and kissed him on the cheek. He stumbled in his grumbling and blushed slightly but managed to recover quickly.

"Thank you, I mean it. Where did you even find him?"

"I…talked to Makina about it and…she thought it was a good idea for you to have a pet so…I found him outside and she let me keep him. She even gave me the pet stuff for free and a massive bag of puppy chow that should last at least two months." The bag was in the closet and it was taking up most of the space. It wasn't a massive closet but the bag of dog food was at least three feet tall.

Kina hugged him again and kissed his cheek about ten more times before he managed to push her off-claiming not impropriety but the fact that there were children in the room. Ganta was watching Shiro play with the puppy; Kina rolled her eyes and laughed.

It seemed though that Crow's plan had worked. For the entire day Kina seemed to be doing better than she had in a very long time. She was smiling more, laughing more, and for once staying off of her feet like she was supposed to. And it was all thanks to a four pound ball of fluff and going to Makina and asking for a favor.

That part he hadn't been too thrilled about and it almost threw a wrench into his plan to get Kina a pet. Makina was a domineering woman with a no shit attitude that got people sliced up like cheap cake. And plus she hated just about everyone and everything. If he went to her and asked her for a favor what was there to prevent her from killing him just because she felt like it? He had spent six hours trying to figure out how to ask without something horrible happening because of it. Kina had been asleep for most of it so she didn't see the indecision he was dealing with. Eventually he just sucked it up. He figured "I'm strong enough to kill people, I think I can ask for a favor" and if she tried to kill him then he would just do to her what he did to everyone else.

The meeting had gone quicker than he thought it would. Makina was sitting in her office doing computer work when he knocked on the door and walked in. She had nothing but contempt on her face when she saw him but she held back any comments she may have had for him. It was absolutely awkward to say the least. He stumbled around the words a lot until she snapped and he just came out with it. When Makina heard that they puppy would have been for Kina any issues she may have had with it were squashed and she let him have his pick of strays that had been around the prison. She usually had them sent to a shelter so they could get adopted but it would be easier if she could just get rid of one without involving anyone from the outside.

There had been six dogs to choose from. One was black and white and mildly furry; two were completely furless and looked a little more than freaky. Two more were tan but one was missing a leg and the other was missing an eye. Crow was about to give up when he saw this small little fluff ball that was running around Makina's office as quickly as its tiny little legs could carry it. It ran into his leg and commenced to chewing and tugging on his pant leg. That pretty much decided it right then and there. If there was any dog that would be perfect for Kina then it would be a little ball of energy. He picked it up and it cured up in his hand and quickly went to sleep. Makina made sure that he had everything he needed for the puppy and it had already been to the vet-Makina never sent dogs out to be adopted if they had fleas and any kind of worms. And it had been fixed.

"What are you going to name him?"

"Youkou," she said without missing a beat. Crow smiled and chuckled despite himself. "Like it?"

"Yes. Let's see if he likes it." Crow got up and walked over to the puppy, plucking him from Shiro's arms and sitting him about three feet away from the bed facing Kina. She watched as Crow fought to get the pup to sit for about seven minutes solid. When he was finally cooperating Kina called his name. His ears perked up and he cocked his head to the left. She called his name four more times before he got up and started taking hesitant steps towards her. When she kept calling him he ran over and bounced up trying to get on the bed.

"Looks like he's smarter than he seems," Crow said and Kina grinned happily. About twenty minutes later there was a crackle over the PA system. They were ordering a lock down on the jail. Apparently there were sick inmates running around. Kina looked up at Crow, asked him if he had seen anything and he said no. When he had gone to talk to Makina he hadn't seen anyone that looked even a little unhealthy. Ganta and Shiro were both clueless as to what was going on so Crow walked over to the window in the door.

There were about seven inmates that were roaming the halls outside his door. This was odd because G-block wasn't somewhere that just anyone could get into. He watched them walk aimlessly around the halls and noticed that all of them were moving quite sluggishly and coughing horribly and there was blood pouring from just about every visible orifice. And the blood was forming into semi-solid forms and moving like an angry snake.


	12. Chapter 11

Crow started barricading the door with anything he could get his hands on. In seconds everything that was on the table-neatly put on the floor-and he pushed it up against the door, jamming the edge under the door handle and then he started putting other things against it to reinforce it. Kina looked at him, worried and confused as he went to the bathroom and grabbed a towel and placed it over the window and then putting another one on the floor by the edge of the door to prevent anyone from sliding anything under the door. Granted anything that would be pushed under would have to be extremely thin but he wasn't taking any chances.

"Senji, what are you doing?" Kina had crawled to the head of the bed to get as close to him as she could. He stood at the door for a minute or two before relaxing a little and realizing that he had probably just scared the hell out of everyone in the room. Shiro, who never showed any fear around him, looked scared and even Youkou looked terrified in his little bed.

"That announcement; there are sick inmates in the hallway," he quickly described what he saw, refusing to allow anyone near the door to see for themselves. "I don't know what it is or what's going on but while Wonderland is on lockdown we aren't leaving this room."

"But what about food and candy?" Ganta asked.

"Considering it's not a riot causing lockdown they'll have to bring us food. As for candy, you should have some on you," Ganta did but it was only one piece. What if they were stuck in that room for a week? Ganta shook his head. Just because Crow and Kina's living arrangements had been approved didn't mean that they could treat it like an apartment and just have four people and a puppy living in it.

Youkou whined sadly and walked over to hide in Shiro's hair. Crow was more worried about Kina than anything else. Among other things she had a weak immune system and he was extremely concerned that she could catch whatever was going around the prison. But where the hell did this virus come from?

Crow didn't know much about viruses or anything medical really so he was the last person to be attempting to figure out anything. The PA system croaked to life again ordering all inmates to stay in their rooms and announcing that they were not to leave under any circumstances unless there was an emergency. And there were protocols given for how to act during an emergency. The only thing that Crow could think of really as he listened to the announcements was that if there were infected people down in G-block which was pretty much sectioned off from the rest of the prison; for the entirety of the prison to be put on lockdown, including the basement, then the upper level must be absolutely chaotic.

After listening to Kina and Ganta speak together, he heard that they came to the same conclusion that he had, but probably quicker. They asked Crow to describe what he was seeing and Kina wrote it down on a little notepad that she kept by the bed. Normally it was used to keep track of her medication schedule so she had to flip a lot to find a blank page. The scratching of the paper was for some reason very irritating to Crow. And then out of nowhere there was the sound of metal on cement and Shiro was wriggling through the grate saying that she was going to go find out more about what was going on. She was saying she couldn't get sick and no matter what they said she just shimmied her way up and out.

She was gone for quite a while. Crow got in the habit of getting up to the window to see how the events outside his door were progressing. There seemed to be less people wandering around but there wasn't any sign of them being taken away or handled in any way. But over the next few hours they started hearing odd sounds coming from the upper floors.

At first it was too difficult for them to discern what the sounds were. They only heard faint echoes of echoes. It got irritating fairly quickly so they popped in a movie and turned up the volume so they wouldn't be able to hear what was going on except the PA system.

The food didn't show up for hours, by the time it had they were all starving and their stomachs were protesting the lack of food quite angrily. And the food came in little brown bags through, of all things, the vent system. Somehow the guards and Makina had figured out a delivery system that used the vents to make sure everyone had food. Her medicine even came that way, in three small, neat little bottles.

Shiro finally came back well after midnight, the incident had started early in the afternoon. She was a little dusty from being in the vent shafts all day but other than that she seemed completely unscathed. She hopped through the grate with hands full of snacks and grinned as she passed them around the room, even giving Youkou a banana that she had somehow managed to snag. He perked right up and tore into it.

"So what did you see out there?" Ganta asked her as he munched on pudding.

"Lots. There are a lot of sick people upstairs. They all look sick, bleeding and falling everywhere and then they died on the ground. And the ones that didn't die got shot," she said nonchalantly and dug into her snack. Everyone looked around at each other and suddenly it made sense. That was what the sounds they had been hearing were. It was only a matter of time until they made their way down to G-block to kill the infected.

And in an hour, they heard gunshots. Loud and often. There were screams and grunts, groans and thuds as bodies hit walls and floors and flailed before their bodies gave out. It was horrible; it sounded like a small war outside their room. They all felt a little disturbed by what they knew was going on all around them and Ganta made his way to the bathroom to vomit more than once in the two hours that the slaying ensued.

Through the night they head cleanup crews scrubbing the floors clean and some sort of machine that they were using to test the air, to see if there were any contagions in it. Apparently there weren't because the next day the lock down was revoked and the inmates were allowed out like nothing had happened. Of course the only think that anyone could think about was the craziness that had happened during the previous day.

Kina didn't feel like leaving the room for fear of catching something, Ganta only left to go take a shower and Shiro was off doing whatever it was that she did with her time. That entire day Kina was absolutely terrified of getting sick. Some weird illness that had people bleeding from every hole and acting like zombies? She was taking absolutely no chances what so ever.

The days passed and people stopped talking about it and the PA system went back to disuse. Business went on as usual at DW . There were shows and the Dog race and Crow and Kina both got more Carnival Corpse shows. Neither was injured in their fight and both fights ended quickly. Kina's fractures healed solidly and she was allowed out of the walking casts and taken off of bed restrictions but she still was limited to what she was allowed to do and how much she could walk. She was given physical therapy exercises to do and she made sure to do them every day otherwise Crow would get a little testy. Youkou even grew a little bit bigger and got a little bit fluffier before the illness was addressed again.

But when it was mentioned it was in a questioning way or even a "hey, do you remember this?" Everyone was getting food in the cafeteria and walking back to their rooms when they heard a loud explosion which turned out to be many tables being flipped over. There were six armed guards that were on top of whoever had flipped the table.

The people in the cafeteria cleared to the walls as quickly as they could. The only thing that could be seen under the pile of guards was a bloody hand that was grabbing at the air from beneath the bodies and a tendril like whip of blood slashed through the bodies. Everyone flipped and ran from room, stampeding over many other inmates. Ganta got swept away down the hallway and Kina got crushed against a wall. Crow got pinned against the guard rail and no one could get to safety for a few minutes.

The sick inmate's body was rushed from the cafeteria and all of the inmates were rushed back to their cells and DW went on lockdown for the second time in a six month period.


	13. Chapter 12

Ganta knew that people in relationships argued occasionally but he was pretty sure that those arguments, with normal people at least, didn't end in the destruction of furniture. And the look on Kina's face; surprise, anger, shock, and if Ganta wasn't confused, a little fear, he was positive that it wasn't a normal argument. Crow was long gone and Kina was standing in the center of the room. The bed was shredded; the table was over turned and shattered, the TV was on its side, the screen bouncing between snow and a black screen while making a horrible static sound or a high pitched wail. It was like a tiny storm had gone through the room and in the span of a few minutes had more or less destroyed the room.

"Kina?" Youkou ran over to Ganta as he walked farther into the room and bounced around his shoes whining for attention. "What happened in here? Are you okay?" She nodded absent mindedly and looked around at the mess around her. Ganta had no idea what she was thinking; she wasn't thinking at all.

"Crow," that was a massive red flag. Kina _did not_ call Senji Crow. It was something that she avoided no matter what, even if he was being irritating, and he had tried to talk her out of it more than once. DW had only been off of lock down for a few weeks and Crow had been set up for three fights since the lock down had been lifted.

His first fight had been fine, nothing less than everyone expected of him. But his second fight had been a little hairy. He had won of course, he wasn't going to lose unless he died or someone got really lucky. But the fight had been hard to watch, especially for Kina. Crow had gone up against an especially talented Deadman and it was one that no one had ever seen before. His name was Titmouse. And his name fit him well.

He was a small man and he bounced around a lot and always hummed-like his song bird namesake. But he was an excessively violent fighter with a ranged Branch of Sin that was similar to Ganta's in the fact that he fired it from his body. But instead of firing bullets he fired rounded cones with a wicked tip that he could expand or contract regardless of how far away it was from his body. And Crow hadn't been expecting that, he even got a little cocking, laughing at the man's designation. But when the fight got started, Crow found himself blocking quickly and even getting speared in the extremities and suffering a penetrating blow to the chest. Kina was horrified the entire fight and when he won and was brought into the infirmary she bolted down the hall and up to the higher floors, stopping and turning into the room so suddenly that she slid and slammed into a table.

Thankfully it wasn't Dr. Rei who was in the infirmary but an older gentleman who was actually quite polite. Crow tried to calm her but there was no way that he was going to hide how much pain he was in. His arm was twisted in an unnatural shape and his chest was torn and bleeding badly. He had to be put under so that he could be surgically repaired and Kina refused to leave his side. She spent every second with him until he was allowed to go back to his room and she refused to leave his side there, Ganta had to bring the both of them food every day. And Crow was slated for a fight a week later.

That was what the fight had been about.

Tamaki had already told Crow that it wouldn't be feasible for him to fight in this upcoming fight. The only reasons he had any concern was because if Crow lost because he wasn't fighting at his peak, then Tamaki would lose money and that was something that he wasn't willing to deal with. And if Crow wasn't going to lose to someone who was his equal then he shouldn't be risking a death at all.

Kina tried to talk Crow out of the fight. He could barely stand due to the surgery and injuries he had sustained but he wouldn't listen to her.

"You aren't in any condition to be fighting!" Kina was distraught over the idea that he was willing to fight in his condition.

"I'll be fine; there isn't a single Deadman here that could beat me, even like this."

"Obviously not if Tamaki said he doesn't want you fighting!"

"I don't give a shit what that fox faced ass hole has to say about anything! Let alone my fights!" Crow rarely ever raised his voice at Kina and she was surprised by it. "Now stop trying to talk me out of it, I'm fighting and that's the end of it!"

"Look at yourself Senji! You just had a major surgery; you'll break your arm all over again, or worse!" The word 'break' was what had set him off. Not the fact that she was trying to tell him what to do. Not that she was ignoring what he said. But the fact that she though he could be broken was more than he could handle, and more than he would tolerate thinking about.

He snapped.

Without even thinking about it, his Invisible black had ripped through almost everything in the room and sent Kina's hair whipping painfully around her face and into her eyes. He felt as if he'd proven his point.

"See that?! If I was going to break then I wouldn't still be this strong!" He was inches from her face now and her wide, terrified eyes weren't registering with the logical part of his brain. He didn't realize he was scaring her. "I. Don't. Break, Kina!" It was a declaration, and almost a challenge. With that he stormed from the room and down to the Carnival Corpse arena. Ganta had walked in just a few minutes later.

"Crow went to go fight," was all she said. Her actions were robotic after that. She flipped the table back over but it was useless, every piece of furniture needed to be replaced. She went to the commissary and purchased everything that was needed. She made sure everything was the same as it had been before the fight and some of the men, and Ganta, were kind enough to help her set up the room. Even Ganta;s friend You showed up for the first time in months and helped move things in. Although the TV was now replaced and set up, even plugged into the wall, she made sure it stayed off. She didn't want to see the fight.

Everyone knew, or almost everyone knew, that Crow would win.

He came back after the fight to find Kina, Ganta and You all at the same table playing a card game. Ganta greeted him warmly as always, congratulated him on his win and introduced You. You stumbled through a greeting and couldn't help but stare. Kina kept her eyes on the cards in her hand and said nothing at all.

Crow knew he had fucked up. The entire walk down to the arena he had been thinking about the terrified look on her face, how he had been right in her face yelling, and how stupid he had been; how close he had come tom injuring her. She was just worrying about him. He couldn't blame her for that, he really didn't have any business fighting but he wasn't going to let his injuries win.

Although he had done a lot more damage to himself during this fight. Since he had barely healed form the last one, most of his wounds were re-opened and he stressed the site of the surgery in his arm to its breaking point. Kina was right and he knew it but he couldn't listen to her. He had to be stubborn, he had to be right, and he had to be stronger than anyone and anything.

He had been wrong.

He noticed that the room was cleaned up and that all of the furniture-although it looked the same-was completely new. The guilt he felt was horrible, like a crushing stone in his gut. Ganta, being the smart kid he was, came up with a reason for him and You to leave the room and Kina waved them off. Youkou had been sleeping in his little doggy bed until the door shut behind the two teens.

"So-"

"Glad you won," Kina walked over to the bed, picked up the pills that had been left on the nightstand for her next scheduled use-she was behind, the wanted to wait until he came back self-took them and then laid down with her back to him. Crow sighed and looked down.

"I'm sorry Kina…" she didn't respond. Sorry wasn't good enough. He walked over to her and Youkou ran over and growled at him. Crow sighed at sat on the floor, letting the dog growl at him.

"I know. I now, I'm sorry to you too Youkou," Youkou barked at him. "What, you won't accept my apology?" The small dog's next huff was a resounding no. He sighed. "Well I don't know what to tell you except I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you, or yell or break…everything," he said looking around the room. Crow looked away from Youkou who had stopped growling, and looked at Kina's back. "I'm sorry…I hurt you…and didn't listen…and couldn't admit you were right…" Youkou seemed appeased and walked into Crow's lap, curling up contently and whining in his own little way.

Kina lay silent on the bed.

"Would you say something? I don't even care if you say you hate me just, just acknowledge that I'm here," he was almost begging her. He hated the cold feeling in the put of his stomach that was caused by their fight earlier. It hadn't gone away even during the fight he'd had a while earlier. "Kina please, I'm _sorry_," he got up and leaned on the edge of the bed. He heard a sniffle and sighed.

The next thing he knew Kina's small fist was planted heavily in his face, almost crushing his nose to dust. He couldn't help the yell that came out of him as he fell from the bed and she landed on top of him. She was crying and beating him on the chest and calling him every horrible name she could think of. He couldn't help smiling, even though he was sure his nose was fractured at the very least.

"You bastard! Why couldn't you just listen to me for once?!You could have died, you could have lost your arm or," she sniffled and sat on his stomach sniffling and crying and covering her face like a small child. She even hiccoughed a few times.

"I'm sorry Kina. Stop crying before you make yourself sick," he sat up and hugged her with one arm while supporting himself with the other, uninjured arm. He kissed the top of her head and sighed. He felt like an ass, a massive ass. This was something he always wanted to avoid; making her cry or worry, or even make her angry at him. "I promise, next time I'll listen."

"Swear?" She looked up, sniffled, hiccoughed, and wiped her cheeks.

"I swear. Now, please stop crying." Kina was still crying, even after she got up and got back into bed. He pulled the sleeves of his coat over the heels of his hands and wiped her face clean. "There. That's much better. Lay down," he went to the bathroom and washed up, closed the door and sighed heavily. He felt more drained after apologizing than he had after the fight, after the surgery, even after his first week in DW. He felt as drained as he could possibly be. It was the crying that had done it, he hated seeing her cry, hated hearing it, he even hated it when she made herself sick. Especially over him.

When he walked back out Kina was curled up under the blanket, with her back to the wall now. Youkou was up on the bed with her, lying on her stomach and shaking a toy as violently as he could-which wasn't very violent at all. The chuckle that slipped out of him was involuntary but he didn't care. He laughed more around her, even if it was a little bit and he liked it. She was smiling and grabbing the toy and shaking it gently to entice him.

He scooped Youkou up and set him on the floor with his toy and got in bed next to Kina, with his coat off, and pulled her close to him.

"You tired?"

"Not really? Even if today was extremely stressful," she sighed heavily and lay on his chest.

"Good."

A/N: I don't remember if I addressed this or not, but with the spelling of You's name, I know it was inconsistent before. Well his name is spelled You in the credits and manga so, there you go ^^ also, I don't know if I'm going to write a lemon, I guess that's up to the readers


	14. Chapter 13

"I don't know why Crow was hiding you from me but I'm going to have to do something about that," Chaplin said as she draped her arms around a giggling Kina. All Kina had done was laugh since Chaplin showed up. The exchange between her and Crow had been hysterical. "Although I have to say, if I didn't get to sleep with you because of puppy interference I'd be a little angry too," Crow blushed immensely and shuffled off to the corner of his room.

"What do you want Chaplin?" He asked.

"Well I've caught glances of you and her together but since you decided to never bring he by, I decided to see her for myself. I don't blame you for hording her though," she beamed at Kina and Kina beamed back, clearly enjoying the attention. She was a social butterfly and that was one of the things that had drawn Crow to her when she saved his ass all those years ago. She could light up a room like a sun. In DW that light had all but been extinguished.

Chaplin spent a few good hours in their room, learning about Kina and Crow's relationship, playing with Youkou who had taken an instant liking to Chaplin. All in all it was a good half a day and a little while after lunch, she decided that she and Kina were going to go shopping. Now this wasn't a choice that was made on a whim; Chaplin went through Kina's clothes and saw a few pairs of shoes that were hidden under a pile of clothes. Some were wedges and some were pumps, not a one had a heel that was smaller than five inches. When Chaplin saw them she squealed and scared everyone in the room and ran over and snatched Kina up.

"We're going shopping!" Kina blinked. "Trust me Crow, when we get back you won't even recognize her."

"You better not dress her like you. Y'know what, I'm coming. I don't trust you," he scowled and stood up. Chaplin rolled her eyes and happily dragged Kina to the clothing area of their "commissary" and forced Crow to stay in the men's clothing area for the entire trip. Chaplin hardly had to help. When Kina was put into the clothing section Chaplin was demoted to being nothing more than an item holder. Kina raided the clothes, the shoes, accessories and bras and underwear. Crow didn't see anything at all. They spent a total of three hours in the store and any time Crow tried to sneak a peek; Chaplin would force him away.

The amount of bags that they had to carry back to their room was insane and by the time they were all piled up in the closet, it would barely close. Chaplin rushed off almost as soon as they got back-there was a Carnival Corpse that she needed to commentate on and made them both promise to tune in and listen to her.

"Well that was interesting," Kina said as she lay down. She had missed her medicine by two hours so she was in a lot of pain and her entire back was swollen and the muscles were spasming relentlessly. Youkou ran over to the bed and yipped and barked until Crow leaned over and picked him up and placed him on the bed so he could be by her.

"I guess. But she can't keep her mouth shut. At all."

"So? What do we have to hide?" Crow opened his mouth to say something. Then closed it and opened it again and closed it-like a fish. "Seriously? You're twenty five, adults have sex, or in our case, get cock blocked by fuzzy puppies," Youkou yipped and wagged his tail as if he were proud of himself. "If it's that big a deal then I'll ask her not to say anything and then we won't give anyone the chance to have anything to talk about."

Crow missed the meaning of her words and just nodded in agreement.

Ganta came by with Shiro and You during the Carnival Corpse; Kina was sleeping soundly and missed the entire thing. The next few weeks all passed the same way. One day though, Kina brought up the odd virus that had been affecting people, giving them Deadman like abilities. The PA system had stayed silent and no one else seemed to be affected by the virus but it was odd that there was no information that was being given. They weren't even telling people that it was a flu. The staff just acted as if nothing happened. And given the kind of prison that DW was, that was odd. Shiro came up with the idea to sneak into different offices and to try and find as much information about the virus as he could. Everyone argued with her saying it was a bad idea but their arguments fell on deaf ears and she shimmed into vent after vent to get into the offices.

Even Kina decided to help. It wasn't uncommon for her to be in the infirmary often and one day while she was getting a shot on the left side of her rear-birth control-she looked around for any files that had been left out. Whenever she had a free chance she would sneak over to the exposed files and read through them. If they were interesting then she would fold up the papers and hide them in her oversized sweatshirts. She hadn't started wearing her new clothes yet. But no one seemed to notice.

One day she was in the infirmary getting small heat packs that could be used and then thrown away. The nurse in there at the time had no clue where they were and had to go to a storage room to find them. That was when Kina started snooping around the room. She found loads of files that had been left unattended and tried to decide which would be the least missed if they went missing. While she was searching she heard odd scratching sounds on the walls in the room. She looked around but there was nothing to be seen. After a few minutes Kina had loaded up on files and was making her way back to the examination table when something caught her attention out of the corner of her eye.

At first she had no clue what it was but as she looked around she caught sight of it again. It was a small black blur, a fast moving…something, but she didn't have the chance to get a good look at it. Whatever it was, was around two and a half to three feet tall and was very quick and shaped like a little person. Kina chocked it up to stress and the small bouts of depression she had started having and when the nurse came back she thanked her politely and left for her room. There she pulled out all of the files, seven in total and started going over them with Ganta and You. Shiro and Crow were a little useless when it came to menial tasks like that. And she kept what she had seen to herself.

A/N Please review and remember, be nice, no flames, nothing like that.


	15. Chapter 14

"When was the last time you slept?"

"Last night."

"No. I mean really slept?"

"Like I said, last night."

"Then why are the bags under your eyes huge and purple."

"Guess I'm not getting that rested."

"Are you sick?"

"Not that I know of," the constant questioning was starting to work her nerves in like the worst possible way. So, she hadn't been sleeping well, so what if she looked like crap. Stop with the questions, just shut up-it was all she could think of.

"Why are you being so short with me?"

"Why are you asking me so many questions?" Kina rubbed her eyes with her knuckles a little rougher than she had intended. Most of the purple under her eyes was actually bruising from her rubbing her eyes so hard. In truth, Kina hadn't gotten a good night's sleep in weeks.

Not only had she been running errands trying to find information on the illness that had swept the prison, but she had been seeing that small little shadowy figure everywhere she turned. It was like a horror movie. Any time that she was alone, it was always there. It was never directly in front of her but it also didn't stay on the edge of her vision. The figure stay just far enough away that Kina couldn't tell exactly what it was but close enough to make the hair on the back of her neck stand up. One night, while Crow had been doing some late night training, Kina had walked from the bed to the bathroom and when she opened the door to go back to bed, the shadowy little figure was so close she could have touched it. It turned her bowls to ice water and she collapsed against the wall and let out a small, shrill scream despite herself. When Crow came running into the room, she told him that she tripped and had hurt one of her legs and that was the why she screamed.

When they went to bed that night, she slept with her back pressed so firmly against the wall that it left and impression on her back and she clung to him like a small baby animal. Crow was confused but didn't argue with it.

After that, she had barely slept. Maybe two hours at the most every day. She couldn't focus and had been getting short and snappy with everyone. Even her fights had changed. She wasn't sloppy necessarily but she was rushed and made a huge mess of whoever her opponent was. Crow noticed it and had asked her about it but she said she was just irritated with the fighting and was confused about why the illness was being lied about. There were inmates going missing left and right but it was never an actual deadman. It was just a regular inmate who was on death row.

That seemed to be the common thread. All of the inmates that got sick or went missing were inmates that were on death row. It wasn't suspicious at first until the ones disappearing were inmates that either Crow or Kina knew. They knew the last time these people had eaten their candy and when they were reported dead it was far too soon for them to have died from the poison from their collars.

The entire day, Kina was in a perpetual bad mood. She hardly said a word to anyone and was more or less as anti-person as someone could be. She nodded off a lot and when she woke up it was with a violent jerk that usually caused her to hurt herself and she would swear in irritation. It was so uncomfortable for anyone to try to deal with her that Ganta hardly stayed around and Shiro was hardly anywhere to be seen, but that had become the norm since they all decided to figure out what was really going on.

That night, Crow sat Kina down and for a minute just looked at her. Her cheeks flushed angrily-she felt like she was being inspected.

"What?"

"What's up with you Kina?"

"What do you mean?"

"You haven't been yourself. Honestly you've been kind of a bitch. You're snapping all the time and being just mean," at the word 'bitch' Kina's hands curled into painfully tight fists. If it had been anyone else, she would have broken their jaw but since it was Crow, she just sighed and looked down. "What's going on with you? Are you getting worse? Are you in more pain? Can I help?" He was genuinely worried and Kina couldn't lift her eyes.

Her shoulders slumped and out of nowhere her eyes started stinging. She wanted to tell him about what she had been seeing but at the risk of sounding insane she didn't know what to say. When Crow heard her sniffle his worry ratcheted up from any type of acceptable level to the kind that caused people to have ulcers overnight.

"I've been seeing things…"

"Things like what?"

"I don't know…this little…thing…it's like, I dunno a little person." She waited for him to laugh or to ridicule her but he didn't.

"Like a small inmate or something?"

"No, I don't know. It's just a shadowy little person and it's always there! No matter where I am, or what time it is, I always see it!" She sniffled and covered her face. "I can't sleep, I can't eat, I can't do anything, I'm so scared," she whimpered weakly. Crow wrapped his arms around her and pulled her to him. She was shaking.

"Well whatever it is, the next time you see it, point it out to me. I'll handle it."

"And just how do you plan to do that?" This voice was new and small. High pitched and it tinkled like a warped bell. There was something wrong about it. Kina screamed and buried her face in Crow's shoulder. Crow glared in the direction of the voice and out of the shadows came a small figure about the size of a six year old. It was female with long, slightly curled brown hair. She was a little darker than Kina, like she spent a healthy about of time in the sun. But there was something inhuman about her eyes. There was a red glow around the pupil that filled a quarter of the iris.

"What the fuck-"

"So, how exactly do you plan on handling me?" The little girl asked again. She pulled her hands out from behind her back and slowly they changed into blood covered weapons of murder. When Kina screamed this time, it was accompanied by the sound of slicing flesh.


	16. Chapter 15

When Kina opened her eyes, she was alone on the bed, Crow facing the far wall, the blade in his forearm buried in the shoulder of the small female, pinning her into the stone of the wall. There was fear in the girl's red tinted eyes and they were so wide the corners seemed as if they were about to tear. There was blood pouring from the girl's shoulder and if she had planned on using her odd abilities that idea had been obliterated the moment Crow's blade made contact with her body.

"I'd say ripping your arms off is a good way to handle you," Crow said as he buried his other blade into the girl's left shoulder, pinning her further against the wall. In the next moment Crow had ripped her arms jaggedly from her body and tied the small bleeding thing to a chair before yelling for a guard. By the time the guard got there, the girl was starting to re-grow her arms but they were formless bloody tendrils. Kina was practically in shock and looked as if she was edging towards a black out.

To the shock of everyone in the room, Shiro burst through the vent and dropped in in front of the stunned guard. He had no clue what to do and just stood in the room. In the blink of an eye, Shiro picked up the girl and the chair and went up the vent shaft with her. The guard and Crow just stood there and blinked in confusion. The guard decided he should at least move the arms and picked them up looking nauseated the entire time.

"Uh, you two just…stay put" he said in a warbling voice before throwing the arms aside and vomiting violently in the trashcan by the door. Crow rolled his eyes and glowered at the guard and when he was done vomiting he grabbed the arms and quickly rushed from the room. Ganta came running in a few minutes later.

"Shiro told me what happened, are you okay?" he burst into the room looking from the damaged and blood stained wall that Crow was scrubbing, to Kina who had more or less collapsed against the wall the bed was against. "Someone please explain this to me," he sat on the edge of the bed next to Kina and took her hand. It was cold and clammy and her eyes had a haunted look in them. "What the hell was all of that?"

"Well, I don't know what it was. Kina was telling me how she'd been seeing something lately and then…this little girl popped up and –"

"You cut off a little girl's arms?!"

"That thing wasn't a little girl, it wasn't human!" Crow yelled defensively. "Its eyes were red and it turned his hands into," he waved his hands in a weird, jelly-like manner trying to describe what he had seen. Ganta just looked at him. "Whatever, she wasn't human and she just showed up in here and practically scared Kina to death! She hasn't said a word since it all happened." He stood up from the soapy, bloody floor and wall and washed off his hands.

When he came out of the bathroom he sat on Kina's other side.

"That little….thing Senji I think Tamaki made it." Both Crow and Ganta's mouths dropped.

"Why?"

Kina got up and went through the stolen documents she had been hiding in their desk and came back with a red manila envelope. She opened it and handed it to Crow and showed him the highlighted portions of the pages. It said something about the attempt to create deadmen out of people who had not been infected with the nameless worm. They were taking live human subjects and experimenting on them, injecting them with synthesized nameless worm and creating something called forgeries. But that wasn't the only thing that Tamaki was working on.

Deeper in the papers there was a section with the word classified in big letters across the header of the page. It showed DNA strands, mixes of the DNA of many of the workers and even DNA that had been synthesized by artificial means. That was the one that they used for the experiment, it worked the best. It was shown that the DNA was implanted in specific genes with bits and pieces of the nameless worm to create a seamless, perfect strand of DNA. There was a picture of the little girl that Kina had been seeing. The paper said that she had some regenerative health abilities and that she, instead of making her own blood into a weapon by bleeding, it warped her body and she herself became a bloody weapon.

The papers slid from Crow's hands and fell onto the floor.

"How the fuck is Tamaki getting away with this?"

"Where are the human rights advocates? This has to violate some kind of laws!" Ganta said.

"It does; dozens at least. He's paying them off and doing it behind everyone's backs. That little monster is just the beginning in who knows how many experiments," Kina looked exhausted and fell back onto the bed and more or less curled up in Crow's lap. She made herself as small as possible and hid her face from Ganta. "This place is more evil than anyone knows…"

"Well we need to _let_ people know! I know a guy, his name is Owl and he," Crow huffed.

"We know all about Owl and what he wants to do; he already tried to recruit us."

"Well then you'll help right? I mean with this proof-"

"You don't get it kid. We aren't superheroes are we aren't' in the business of playing the part. They'll just kill everyone involved in his little scheme." Ganta just stared at him. Kina kept quiet and Ganta had a feeling that the main reason-if not the real reason-that Crow didn't want to help, was because he didn't want to risk leaving Kina alone, or worse, risk getting her killed in some plan that wasn't guaranteed to work. On some level Ganta felt that he understood that. Or at least he tried to.

Instead of pushing the issue Ganta helped Crow clean up the rest of the blood from the floor and walls and even covered the cuts in the wall by moving around the table and remaining furniture.

"I'll see what Shiro has to say about this weird little thing and I'll let you know if I learn anything new," Crow nodded at him and Ganta left without another word. Even though he was trying to understand Crow's reasoning he was having a hard time not blaming him for not helping. After all it would help all of them-including Kina. But what did Ganta know; he'd never been in love.

It was a few minutes before Kina said anything else, the next time she opened her mouth, it was to ask a question.

"Why am I moving?" Crow chuckled and stopped the slight swaying motion that he had been engaged in for the past ten minutes. "I'm not a baby you know."

"I never said you were. But this is also the only that calms you down aside from breaking things." Kina twitched uncomfortably.

"You didn't have to stop" Crow could feel the heat from her blush practically searing his chest and shook his head at her.

"You kind of are a baby," she punched him in the liver.

"Ow! Damn woman! You didn't let me finish!"

"Don't get all sappy Senji," he hmm-ed in a questioning tone. "Just…don't. Not here at least." Crow sighed and shook his head.

"If I feel like being sappy, I'm going to be sappy," he said defensively and kissed the top of her head. "And I wasn't going to be sappy anyway so stop hitting my damn organs and enjoy the rocking. Got it." Kina laughed despite herself and relaxed, eventually falling asleep until Ganta showed back up in the middle of the night with more information about the experiment and the little monster it had produced.


	17. Chapter 16

"Ganta half of this shit is written in code. And there are coded portions that seem to be even more coded than the rest!" Kina threw the folder across the room and let it smack into the wall. She groaned and flopped onto the bed and pulled a pillow over her face. Crow was still glaring at the folder he was supposed to be reading and Shiro was playing the corner with Youkou. She hadn't said anything about the little monster she had dragged into the vent system. When asked she had taken to pretending she hadn't heard the question and started talking about food or games .Everyone got fed up fairly quickly and gave up. At least the little thing was gone.

"Maybe we can break the code. We know what it's about generally speaking so maybe we can find some sort of pattern and break it that way," Ganta offered and got to work underlining letters and trying to find where the repeated. The other difficult thing was figuring out what the symbols meant as well. Ganta was at it for two and a half hours before yelling in frustration, throwing the pencil and flinging the papers across the room to join the mess Kina had made earlier. Crow had given up long before and was working out.

"We aren't going to figure it out without some sort of help. If we could find out what just one of those symbols means and what the letters are being used to represent we may be able to figure it out from there," Kina sat up and stared at the papers on the floor. "Ganta when you grabbed these, were these all of the folders?" There were three more coded folders sitting on the table. He nodded. "You didn't see any paper that had the key on it," before Ganta could answer she was already talking but more to herself than anyone else. "No that would be stupid, too easy for someone to come by and grab it," she sighed. "Where did you find them? The infirmary?"

"No it was in Tamaki's office. I noticed that he left the door open and he had tons of copies of these. Some of them had names on them, I guess of the people that are funding the experiments. These were sitting in the printer so I grabbed them all and found the rest of the copies."

"Names? Do you remember any of them?" Kina was almost excited and looked at Ganta with a smile. He looked down and bit the inside of his cheek, shaking his head no.

"I was trying to hurry…I didn't pay much attention to the names," the smile faded from Kina's face as quickly as it had appeared. She was instantly gloomy and flopped back onto the bed with a groan. It was hopeless it seemed. They didn't have the key, they now knew for a fact there were more people involved, people on the outside who were pulling strings inside DW-but they didn't have their names. And they knew-although they had assumed from other documents-that Tamaki was without a doubt the ring leader. They knew that death row inmates were being used in the experiments and had learned of the forgeries existence without having come across any of them. But they still didn't know what the little girl was. She was apparently so important that they didn't want to run the risk of just anyone finding out about her. And the code seemed to be advanced; there were no obvious cracks in it at all. No slips ups. And it was all typed, not hand written so if someone _had_ screwed up and erased, and rewritten the letter or symbol, they had no way of knowing.

It was a bleak outlook to say the least.

"So we give it time. We watch Tamaki, and watch all of the other death row inmates. Watch to see if their habits change and wait to see if anyone makes any mistake we can act on. Use them for information," Crow offered, dropping his weight and sitting on the edge of the desk. "We find a weak point and we add force until it breaks and gives us what we want."

"Wow," Ganta was obviously surprised and maybe even slightly awed. "That was really smart Crow," he smiled. Crow turned red with embarrassment and annoyance.

"I'm not some damn idiot!" Ganta started laughing and Kina bit her lip to avoid laughing. "What you think I'm stupid or something?" He growled. Ganta rushed through a giggly apology and tried to calm Crow down but he was just making things worse.

"Oh calm down," Kina said, almost admonishing Crow like a small child. "You had a good idea, let's just leave it at that before you start a fight with a kid. And you have to admit, you've never been a genius," she grinning in an impossibly adorable way and Crow, although angry, just deflated.

"You too Kina?"

"I say it out of love," Ganta laughed. The air in the room was more or less normal for the rest of the day. Except for the little corner that Shiro had chosen to inhabit. She hardly spoke to anyone and didn't seem interested in the snacks that Ganta brought later in the day. She was just quiet, pensive it seemed. Kina made many attempts to get the usually bubbly girl to open up to her but it was more or less a lost cause.

By the end of the day, Kina's mind was exhausted, Crow was still working out, lunch's garbage was still in the room and dinner was on the way; Kina was in a state of half-awareness due to her medication and Ganta was in his room, talking with You about who knew what. Kina didn't trust him much for some reason. It was a feeling that had popped up recently and she couldn't get it to go away. Shiro had left just before lunch and hadn't been seen since.

"That Shiro girl has been acting a little odd lately," Crow said. He and Kina were sitting on the bed, Kina wrapped in a heated blanket against his chest. "I thought she was always annoying and y'know bubbly and whatever."

"Yeah, I know but I mean, what can we do about it? She just won't talk to us. I'm kind of worried about her to be honest. But," shrugs "If Ganta can get her to talk, we should ask him, maybe ask him to dig into her head, see what he can find out," she shuddered from a chill. "If he can get into her mind," she said with slight incredulity. Crow just shrugged and said maybe.

Kina was positive she wasn't going to get any sleep. The shadows under her eyes were more pronounced than ever but she seemed to fear the idea of sleeping. She was afraid of having nightmares about the little monster girl that had somehow got into their room. Seeing Her turn her hands into bloody daggers, the fingers just vanished…it turned her stomach and then to see her attack Crow, the sound that his blades made when they sank into her body and then in the wall, it was horrible. It made her feel sick in the worst way. She had only eaten lunch because she needed food in her stomach for her medication. If that weren't a necessity then she would have hardly eaten anything at all. She was just scared.

Without meaning to she leaned deeper into Crow's chest, grabbed his jacket and wrapped it around herself before grabbing his hands and wrapping his arms around her. It was all one fluid motion and it was done in the span of two heart beats. Crow's face erupted into a blaze of crimson and he couldn't help the awkward look that grew across his face. Luckily for him, Kina couldn't see him.

"Uh, Kina? What's wrong?"

"I'm afraid to go to sleep." She said simply. "After that girl and everything, and everything we've found out, I'm just scared. I don't want to have nightmares, I have a hard enough time sleeping as it is," she said weakly. Her face was flushed and she was shaking, feeling weak. She hated feeling weak, hated showing it, and especially hated showing it to Crow. She always wanted to be strong around him even if there was no need. He could be strong enough for the both of them; he had done it before and would always do it again. But she didn't want to feel like she _needed _him to be strong for her.

The red slowly faded from Crow's face and he sighed. This place was horrible for Kina. Her illness, the injuries she could incur just from walking around and trying to live a somewhat normal life. Then there was all of the fighting and the general stress of being in prison in general. And the Nameless Worm didn't make anything easy at all.

"Well I'm here…if that helps. I can't fight your nightmares off but…I'll be here when you wake up." He offered weakly. It didn't feel like enough. He was used to being able to fight her battles and protect her, to hid her behind his back and keep her nestled safely against him while he kept away anything that had any inclination to harm her. She was his and his alone to protect and if he couldn't do that, he felt useless. Like when he had been a cop and he hadn't been able to safe the orphans.

"Well, that helps," she said yawning. "Mind if I take you up on that?" She yawned again and stretched wide. Without even waiting for an answer she was already nodding off and in the span of a few minutes had completely drifted into sleep. He chuckled and laid her down, keeping her covered with the heated blanket and tucking it in around her.

While she slept, Crow thought. He was curious about all of the information that they had found out. And worried about if that little monster was somehow going to find her way back. He doubted it; he was pretty sure that Shiro killed her and just hid her body somewhere where no one would find it. Looking around the room, looking at the gashes in the walls, he felt greatly bothered. But he had managed to protect Kina that day. He had kept her safe and kept her away from anything that would have harmed her. He was proud of himself for that at least. But the fight had been a bit sloppy for sure.

Kina had her eyes closed so she didn't see what had happened but Crow almost missed when he struck the girl. And she very narrowly missed slitting his throat. He had actually struck twice before he had pinned the creature. And it had almost not happened. He hated to admit it but the girl had scared the shit out of him. He could tell she wasn't human and the look in her eyes, the red tint to them, and the evil way she held herself, it was disturbing. To see such evil in the body of a small child had been unnerving.

He turned and looked at Kina as she slept. She was curled up under the blanket like a child herself and her fingers were poking out from the very edge of the blanket. Her mouth was parted slightly and she was breathing evenly and she seemed to be resting well. Her hair had spilled around her head like a wispy brown halo. She looked beautiful even in her sleep. He wondered how, all those years ago, she had wandered by at just the right time. If he believed in fate then it would have made sense but seeing as he didn't, he couldn't rationalize it. It was just to perfect that the exact thing he needed in his life in a person had walked by and gotten him out of a nasty fight. And that they'd been joined at the hip every day since was just too much. He wanted to laugh. What had he done to deserve her and to deserve the positives that she had brought into his life? It just made no sense to him.

Crow sighed and shook his head. He loved her, it was obvious. With everything that they had been through, he loved her even more. He leaned over and kissed her, trying not to wake her. When he pulled away, Kina was smiling at him sleepily and grabbed his hand, holding it close to her cheek and dozing off again. All he could do was lie down and wait for when she inevitably woke up screaming. He'd be there, stoic and solid.


	18. Chapter 17

"Ganta…this is like, three quarters of a sheet of paper." Kina didn't sound irritated, she didn't sound, mad, or even remotely upset. She didn't even sound hopeless. Just…like she wanted more information. "But it has a few letters on it; we should be able to at least de-code some of the papers. Or at least parts of some of the papers. She scanned the shredded piece of paper. There were six symbols on it, each one with an equal sign after it and the letter or phrase that it meant. The code was more intricate than they had originally thought. There were combinations of symbols that went into de-coding of just a simple word, or even a letter. Kina got a headache just from thinking about trying to figure it out.

"It was all I could find, I-"Kina hushed him quickly and smiled.

"It's okay, it's not a problem. It's more than we had before and will help at least a little," the smile on her face was genuine. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that she had been getting more sleep lately. Senji was being far more like his old self. When she needed sleep, he didn't take no for an answer. He made sure she was resting, eating, fun. And he made sure she had it, going far out of his way to do it. And he was never more than an arm's reach away. After the incident with the weird little experiment he had been like a wall between her and the world with special windows that only let in the things she needed to see the most and hid everything else. Although she didn't like the thought of being sheltered, she understood the need and allowed him to watch over her in a more intense fashion because she needed it. "We can get started on trying to get some information out of these pages after a little breakfast, sound good?" Ganta nodded but didn't look up to meet her eyes. It was obvious he felt guilty about not finding more.

Crow looked at Ganta and growled in annoyance and before anyone could blink he slammed his fist into the back of Ganta head hard enough to rattle his teeth. Before he could say anything Crow made it very clear that he and Kina were not mad with him, that he had done great and that if he didn't cheer up he was going to continue to hit him until he brain was too scrambled to be upset. Ganta balked at the thought of being hit again and forced himself to smile. Although it was tenuous at best, it was better than nothing and spared him more injury.

Shiro popped up in the hallway, dropping in from the ceiling and landing on her toes with a grin on her face. Kina wondered almost absent mindedly, if she would answer any questions they asked her about what she did with the monster that had been in their room. Probably not. Although the girl was not tight lipped when it came to anything but when asked specifically about the girl, she just changed the subject and danced around it like a ballerina.

They spent another few weeks trying to find more information but they found it odd that there was nothing to be seen. Kina's regular trips to the nurse's office, although not increasing in a suspicious manner, were still more and more frequent but Kina found nothing. And Ganta had become ever more involved with Scar Chain so he was hard to get ahold of at times. Despite the fact that none of them were making any headway, they were still positive; due in most part to Kina forcing everyone to just be happy at the risk of being hit by herself or Crow.

Neither Crow nor Kina had any fights for a very long time and decided to make the most of the time as possible. Youkou went for regular walks around the prison, Kina bought tons of things to decorate their room, she stayed on her meds and was showing marginal improvement, although the pain rarely subsided entirely. She and Crow acted more and more like an average couple as the days went by and it was hardly a rare sight to see them walking through a hallway holding hands, or her in his lap after his work out, or to see them apart at all in any capacity. For a while it almost felt like they _weren't_ in jail for absolutely heinous crimes that they hadn't committed. They felt like normal people.

"Hey, Senji, I have a present for you!" Kina sang and pulled a box from behind her back. It was a black box about a foot and a half by a foot in a half. Instead of being wrapped with wrapping paper it was tied with a red ribbon. The box was a very dull color, there was no shine to it at all but the ribbon was practically dancing in the light. Crow blinked and cocked his head to the side. He had been lifting free weights and, although he was still confused, he didn't stop working out. "Well, take the box," she said and held the box out to him. With a grunt Crow dropped the weight onto the ground and it landed with an extremely heavy thud. It shook the wall of mirrors in the back.

He took the box and examined it, almost looking suspicious of it. Kina caught the look and glowered at him. He gulped and proceeded to open the box. Instead of cutting the ribbon like he wanted to, he took the extra few seconds to untie it and let it fall in a neat little pile on the table. Kina hated when people tore ribbons or wrapping paper. He remembered the first Christmas she had given him a present at school. He had been so eager to get inside that he had shredded the paper to bits. Kits had smacked him square in the cheek loud enough that everyone heard it and strong enough to leave a small little handprint on his face. That was the first and last time he had torn any kind of paper.

The lid to the box he wasn't so careful with and he dropped it onto the floor of the gym. Inside it was a brand new pair of boots. Kina was grinning. Crow looked down at his boots and noticed that they were looking a little ratty. He chuckled and shook his head.

"Thanks Kina," he smiled and fell into a chair and toed his boots off before putting the new ones on. They were a little stiffer than he'd like but that wouldn't last long. They were still nice and shiny and had that new boot smell. "They fit great." She squealed happily and clapped her hands once.

"I thought you could use some new shit kickers," she looked proud of herself and it made Crow laugh.

"Shit kickers?"

"Well…ass kickers just sounds boring and I don't think it does what you do ay justice."

"Hm, yeah I could see that." He said and smiled at her before getting up and hugging her and giving her a quick kiss. "I appreciate it."

After that he went back to working out. Youkou curled up in the corner after tearing around the room like a tiny hurricane and chasing his tail.

"I wonder how Ganta's little Scar Chain thing is going."

Crow laughed outright.

"What, you don't think it'll work? That they'll prove this place is an utter hell-hole and that were all here on trumped up charges?" Crow was practically shaking with laughter. "Well I guess that means no," she scowled but sighed. "I know, there really is no chance for it with Tamaki running this madhouse." Kina was saddened by the thought but it was true and she knew it. There was absolutely no way that a group of Deadmen would be able to prove what was going on. And even if they did…it wouldn't change anything. People with crazy powers wouldn't be accepted into normal society they'd all be condemned and thrown in a second prison. It would be hell either way.

"Hey, cheer up," Crow said and crouched beside her chair and put her hands in his and then put them in her lap. "We'll be fine. Eventually they'll run out of people to put us up against and then they'll leave us alone. Tamaki won't live forever and when he dies, we'll be left alone entirely. I promise. Cheer up, k?" Kina looked at him and sighed.

"You're right."

"Yeah, that happens sometimes," Kina rolled her eyes and stuck her tongue out at him. A few minutes later, she was wincing. Crow's eyes darted around her, to every joint to see where the problem was. As he watched, Kina's left shoulder slowly slid out of the socket. He watched as the left side of her collar bone was pushed forward and out to an odd angle and the ball of the bone itself came out underneath it. It would be nauseating to someone else but to him it was such a normal occurrence that his stomach hardly registered the unnatural sight.

Kina covered her shoulder with her right hand and for a few seconds tried to force the bone back into the joint. The weak scream that slipped passed her tightly pressed lips showed that it was nearly impossible for her to do.

"Come on, let's get back to the room," Crow said and helped Kina up out of the chair and back to their room and into bed. He grabbed an ace bandage and a heating pad and bound it to her shoulder then propped her against a pile of pillows. "Just take it easy, okay?" Kina nodded and winced and tried to relax.

"Thanks for the help," Crow waved her thanks away and sat next to her on the bed. "Now what?"

"Now you rest, maybe take a nap," he grabbed the remote and started flipping through channels as Kina slowly nodded off. A few minutes later there was an impossibly loud explosion that rocked the very foundation of their room.


	19. Chapter 18

Kina knew what it was before Crow had managed to look surprised. It was Scar Chain attempting to get free. She looked at the clock and noticed that it was actually quiet early in the morning. She told Crow and wasn't exactly surprised at the look on his face. He looked…less than hopeful about their plan to escape. Like he'd mentioned before, he thought they had absolutely no chance of escaping but it would turn out later in the day, that he was very wrong.

But by the time Kina and Crow would find that out, it wouldn't matter much anymore. In fact, an hour after the explosion, much of the day wouldn't matter at all. Their odd little visitor made a very violent reappearance. As Kina was sitting on the bed, the little girl slid in through the air conditioning grate which was covered in shadow. She slipped under the bed and while down beneath it, turned her right arm into a small, slender but wickedly sharp blade of blood. She pushed it up between the wall and the bed, angled her arm forward, and stabbed Kina straight through the right shoulder blade.

The scream she let out would have been heard in just about every other ward if it weren't for the earlier explosion and subsequent smaller rumblings and collapses. It chilled Crow straight to the bone and when he saw her pulling herself free of the small blade it hit him instantly what had happened. He had hoped that Shiro had killed the little monster but apparently for some stupid reason, she had let it live. Kina fell onto the floor and left a small bloody trail behind her as she quickly moved behind Crow. Not for protection but so she could get a sense of her bearings. Crow on the other hand, was already ready to attack.

"You little fucking monster!" His eyes were wild with rage and he flew at the bed, grabbing the blade with his bare hand and ripping the little girl up from behind the bed, smashing her head into the wall and throwing her onto the floor before impaling her. He set to work cutting her limbs away. Kina had gotten ahold of herself and the three blades on either of her arms were extended as well as the ones that she had developed in the palms of her hand. She joined Crow and without a second thought, severed the little creature's head from her body, instead of stopping there, severed her spine and shredded it to bits.

Crow was almost afraid of the rage that Kina displayed. It wasn't the same as when she was fighting in the ring when she had to, when she wanted to scare the people that were forcing her to fight. This was pure and unadulterated rage. She was an inferno of violence and blood and it was the most violent he had ever seen her. He didn't know she was capable of something like this but she was now sitting from the small decimated carcass, covered in blood with a wild look in her eyes. Her face was splattered with blood. It took him a minute to realize that she was shaking, covered in sweat and her pupils were pinpricks, she looked like she was about to pass out.

"Kina…you okay?" He was leery of moving over to her. She shook her head and swallowed hard.

"No, no I'm not…." Her stomach gave a visible lurch and she was scrambling to the bathroom and vomiting violently. In between the heaving he could hear her sobbing near hysterically. Crow sighed and felt extremely guilty. How could he feel afraid of her? She was just panicked, and of course she would be. This little monster had tried to kill her and had suddenly reappeared after stabbing her in the shoulder. She probably just snapped and put an end to it. He was mentally kicking himself. How many times had he scared Kina by fighting? How many times had he found her crying when he would come home after work covered in blood and raging? He was being an ass and he knew it.

He walked into the bathroom and pulled her hair away from her face and when she was done puking she collapsed backwards and sobbed. It sounded like she was trying to speak but it was so broken up with sobs that it was impossible to understand her. He wrapped his arms around her and held her as tight as he could. She cried for over half an hour, kept shaking, kept trying to talk. She had scared herself. That's why she was so upset. She had terrified herself by the bloodlust and intense roaring fury she had felt. She didn't want to be capable of something like that. When she had finally calmed down Crow wet a washcloth and cleaned the blood from the face and hands and arms.

"What do we do with the body?" She managed to ask. It was just a bloody mass on the floor now. And it was a good question. Crow grabbed up a bunch of towels and wrapped the left overs of the body up and put them all together in the tub. Then he set to work scrubbing the blood out of the floor. When the laundry cart came by he threw the bundles in. The guy picking up the load said nothing, in fact looked terrified. Crow ordered him to take the bundles to the incinerator and was positive that it would be handled.

"You need to shower, c'mon," he locked the door and grabbed Kina clean clothes and sat on the closed toilet lid while she was bathing. How had that little monster gotten back into their room? And why was it so hell bent on going after Kina? She hadn't even cared about him. It was like he wasn't even there.

Before Kina had gone to shower, he had bandaged her shoulder up and made sure that it was wrapped with silicone. She limped and winced the entire time she was in the shower and whimpered while she bathed herself. It upset him greatly. He hadn't been able to protect her at all. He may have attacked her first but Kina was the one who had finished the thing off. She hadn't even thought about it. He'd let her get hurt.

He needed to find Ganta and get him to bring Shiro around so he could ask her why he hadn't killed that monster. What was the point in keeping her alive? What did Shiro need with her? He needed to make sure that Shiro understood why he was angry. Kina could have died. Wasn't she supposed to be her friend? Wouldn't she want to make sure she was safe? Wouldn't she want to keep the monster away from her? And especially if it could come after Kina it could come after Ganta. The more he thought about it the angrier he got until he couldn't stand it anymore. He told Kina he would be back and went on a manhunt for Shiro.

Instead he found Ganta who looked destroyed. He was breathing heavily and sweating and pale. Shiro was leaning over him, next to Owl's dead body. There was a gaping hole in the wall and ceiling. Instead of questioning her and Ganta about what happened, he scooped the boy up and rushed him out of the room, with Shiro following him an went back to the room he and Kina shared.

"Oh my God, what happened?" Kina hopped off the bed and let Crow put Ganta's weak body on the bed. Crow quickly explained everything that he had seen. Shiro added in information where she could. It was a horror story of epic proportions. But both Kina and Crow were confused.

"Why didn't you leave Ganta? It's what you wanted."

"I can't leave. Not while there still so much going on that needs to be stopped. But some of them escaped, they'll get the word out, it's fine." He smiled weakly and sat himself up and got off the bed. "I don't want to impose. But I'll come by later okay? I'd just rather sleep in my bed tonight." No one fought him and when he and Shiro were gone, Kina nearly collapsed on the bed.

Her shoulder had bled through the bandaging and was ruining her shirt. Crow got the bandages and patched her up as best she could.

"We'll have to go to the infirmary but I think it'd be better to go in a little while if you can manage the wait."

"Yeah, I doubt they want any deadmen roaming around right now. I'm sure the bandage will hold this time." She laid down and pulled him down with her and used him as a pillow. She was still shaking, how could he not see it? It felt like she was shivering.

"Try to sleep. I'll wake you up to go to the infirmary okay?" He kissed her forehead and covered her up and when she was completely asleep he sighed heavily. It had been a horrible day. And he felt so guilty for earlier. He was going to need to make it up to her. Youkou was curled up in the corner, he had vanished when the fighting had started but he was really just hiding behind the door.

Maybe a date would make up for it.


End file.
